Election 2021: Murphy, Ciattarelli to face off for final debate

Listen to this article

The contenders for governor of New Jersey are going head to head Oct. 12, at the last of two gubernatorial debates before voters head to the polls next month.

Gov. Phil Murphy, the incumbent Democrat, will square off for a full hour against Republican Jack Ciattarelli, a Somerset County-based accountant and former state assemblyman, at 8 p.m. at Rowan University in Glassboro.

The prime-time debate is being hosted by NJ Spotlight, and it’s being broadcast live by NJ PBC and WNYC radio; it will also be live-streamed on YouTube and the websites for NJ Spotlight, WNYC and Rowan.

Murphy widely leads Ciattarelli both in voter approval and name recognition, according to some of the latest polls from Monmouth University and Stockton University. But neither poll – which showed Murphy enjoying a 13-point lead according to Monmouth and a 9-point lead seen in the Stockton poll – was conducted after the first debate.

With 1 million more registered Democrats than there are Republicans in the state, Ciattarelli faces a considerable uphill battle.

Ciattarelli has attacked Murphy over his COVID-19 response, including mass business closures that have driven up unemployment. He’s also gone after widespread delays in getting unemployment assistance, and the high death tolls at the state’s nursing homes. The Somerset County native has also gone in on Murphy over high taxes in New Jersey.

And he’s vowed to roll back or slow down the state’s cannabis legalization, arguing that New Jersey voters were misled, despite cannabis’s widespread popularity in the state.

Murphy in turn has attacked Ciattarelli on his ties to former President Donald Trump and his support for the unproven election fraud conspiracies. The current governor has also criticized Ciattarelli over his support of anti-mask and anti-vaccination policies, and his expression of those stances, saying they are unscientific.

Both candidates have been criticized for being light on proposed fixes for any of these policy issues.

During last month’s debate, Murphy promised that he would not raise any further taxes for the next four years, should he be reelected.

But former state Sen. Diane Allen, who’s running to be Ciattarelli’s second-in-command, shot at Murphy’s promise, saying he could not possibly stay true to his word.

“Murphy said last Tuesday that he was not going to raise any taxes for the next four years. On Friday, he raised taxes $250 million a year on businesses,” she said at the Oct. 6 lieutenant governor debate with the incumbent Sheila Oliver.

Businesses said that while they were pleased with Murphy’s promise for no new taxes, they contended that both candidates still came up short for other potential fixes.

“They didn’t really focus much about the details,” said Tom Bracken, who heads the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce. “Murphy talked about stronger and fairer … Ciattarelli talked about his plans for making us a much more competitive state and the go-to place for businesses.”

While on the campaign trail, Ciattarelli has vowed to “declare economic warfare on our neighbors” and “build a better business environment” in the state. He’s proposed making the first $50,000 of business income tax-free and slashing the corporate tax rate in half over the next five years.

In a June interview with NJBIZ, Ciattarelli had looked at phasing out some of the state’s $14.5 billion dollar incentive programs, which he described as an “unfair” system that picks “winners and losers.” His hopes would be that a lower corporate tax rate would do away with the need for tax breaks.

“[W]ith that program, New Jersey is in the business of picking winners and losers,” Ciattarelli told NJBIZ. “Why can’t we just have a tax rate that’s very very appealing to all businesses?”