Can’t Bring Yourself to Vote for Sherrill? Explain Yourself

By Nancy Colasurdo

Before this New Jersey gubernatorial race starts cooking, I desperately need to talk about voting philosophies.

We’re not 24 hours from our state’s primary, won decisively by Mikie Sherrill on the Democratic side -- while we’re literally in the throes of Donald Trump executing his dictatorship plan -- and already we know some who won’t rally behind our candidate.

As the Marines slide into Los Angeles under the guise of Trump and Stephen Miller’s “riots” and the tanks roll into Washington, D.C. for their wannabe-strongman parade, we still must convince part of our electorate that purity and protest voting this November is not the way to go.

Huh?

There are citizens all over this nation mobilizing for a massive “No Kings” protest this weekend and our Felon President is calling for force.

But Sherrill is not what? Sane enough?

Yes, she needs to be diligent over the coming months in courting voters far to her left. The other side – the now-MAGA Jack Ciattarelli – will spend the next five months mocking her for making so much of her mission about beating back Trump.

Bring it on, please. More of that, ma’am. Beat the son of a bitch into submission.

It’s vexing to me to think otherwise.

I know what Democrats stand for. I know there’s this whole narrative out there questioning our messaging and whether we have a plan. Yada, yada, yada. But I’m clear we stand for me and you keeping our Social Security and Medicare; not firing federal workers at will; not handing a tax break to billionaires; not flouting rule of law and knocking over any roadblocks to checks and balances; not diminishing higher education and research and medical advances; not stalking law-abiding people at school and work to snatch them off the street and maybe even “disappear” them; not inviting unsuspecting people to a supposed court hearing only to handcuff them and cart them away.

There’s so much more, but you get the gist.

With Jack, ICE officers run amok and terrorize New Jerseyans without a fight. In fact, they get a welcome mat. You’re good with that?

With Jack, a woman seeking treatment for a miscarriage will come up against untold obstacles, as is happening in other states. Reproductive rights will be screwed. You’re A-OK with that?

A member of Trump’s army running our state works for you? Hey, what could possibly go wrong?

Jack will continue to criticize Sherrill for obsessing over Trump, as he did in his victory speech, because he doesn’t want you to focus on the fact that he caved to a craven criminal to advance his own interests.

All of this on the eve of a monumental march The Felon is clearly pissed about and using intimidation tactics against.

If there is one thing I have already learned from being a few weeks into an online Harvard course called Justice, it is to question my own absolutes. In a lecture, the professor presents a situation and I am clear where I stand and can state why. On its heels he tells us about another scenario where using that same logic doesn’t work.

I wind up questioning my own principles – should the greater good always be figured into my stance? Oftentimes, but not always. The teachings have me thinking about our elections and the way many Democrats and Independents decide how to cast their votes.

I understand that many voters feel strongly about voting for the candidate that lines up with their values, even if it’s a third-party one with no chance of winning. Or, they don’t like the person selected in the primary, so they sit out voting at all. And I’m acutely aware that many – particularly progressives – resent being accused of “electing” Trump by virtue of their aforementioned choices.

I invite you then to please respond to this column and explain where your thinking is now. In the 2024 presidential election, many voters made it clear they couldn’t vote for Kamala Harris because of her stance on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It was their deal-breaker.

OK. What exactly, then, did your vote do to help the dying and suffering Palestinians? This is where my understanding of this voting logic breaks down. Is it virtue signaling? I’m really asking.

Because not only is the situation there ongoing, we now have people dying around the globe as a result of Elon Musk’s short-lived but potent terror rule through our federal government, specifically slashings at U.S.A.I.D. (PEPFAR). According to a recent Nick Kristof column in The New York Times, Pres. George W. Bush’s highly successful program focused on AIDS relief has saved more than 26 million lives.

Contrasted with this administration?

“An ‘impact counter’ developed by an economist estimates that about 300,000 people have died so far from the reductions in American assistance, two-thirds of them children,” Kristof writes. “The death toll is said to be rising at a rate of 103 per hour.”

Only three and half more years of this to go. To boot, our Secretary of State denies this is happening on his watch.

Oh, and by then the effects of loosening or eliminating our regulations on medicine and food and clean air will hit. More suffering and death right here in our borders.

This isn’t a game. Old political party grudges are going to cost us even more than they already have. And this isn’t even about politics anymore.

It’s about our moral center.

Only one major candidate for New Jersey governor has held hers.