Politics
Cory Booker on track to winning Senate seat despite setbacks
It is almost certain that Booker, a Stanford graduate and Rhodes scholar who grew up in the New York suburb of Harington Park, N.J., will be criticized during the primary for his fast-paced ambitions. One opponent, Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver, offered a glimpse of what is to come by proclaiming, “I don’t bring a sense of entitlement” to the race.
Oliver, who like Booker is black and from Essex County, could peel away minority and female votes that would otherwise go to Booker.
The two others in the race, Rep. Frank Pallone, a 24-year veteran of Congress with deep ties to organized labor, and Rep. Rush Holt, both have voting records more liberal than Booker’s. Additionally, the powerful public teachers union could come out against him because of his push for charter schools, school vouchers and other urban education reforms the union opposes.
Booker’s mere entry into this race meant backpedaling on his publicly stated intent to finish his second term as mayor of New Jersey’s largest city, which expires next June. Asked about the turnabout during his campaign kickoff at a downtown dot-com, Booker acknowledged that his campaign plans had been upended.
“The reality is we have put so much into the pipeline here in Newark,” he said. “The momentum is clear. There is about US$1 billion worth of development projects rolling into the city. As much as you might think I am necessary to complete those projects, this momentum will continue, and I will continue to be a part of it.”
Though he swears his allegiance to his adopted city, critics say he cares more about building his national brand than fixing the city’s systemic problems of crime and joblessness.
Critics see the rescue of a woman from a burning house and subsequent tweets about the experience (he has 1.4 million Twitter followers) as self-promotional, and say his investment in the downtown has come at the expense of neighborhoods where blight and crime persist. Critics say his trip to California the day after announcing his Senate candidacy for a fundraiser hosted by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is more evidence that he has already put Newark, and New Jersey, in his rearview mirror.
