Highlights from last night's primaries in New Jersey, Montana and Iowa:
- The son of embattled Sen. Bob Menendez beats back a serious primary challenge in NJ-08.
- In the New Jersey Senate primary, Republican voters reject the Trump-backed candidate and choose openly gay developer Curtis Bashaw.
- In IA-01, Republican David Pautsch rallies evangelical voters and comes within 12 points of defeating GOP Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks.
New Jersey’s powerful political machine has taken several hits over the past year — the fall of indicted senior Sen. Bob Menendez, the collapse of First Lady Tammy Murphy’s establishment-backed Senate campaign, and finally, the judicial overthrow of the state’s “county line,” a ballot design system that allowed county party organizations to elevate their preferred candidates.
But even without the county line system, New Jersey’s political establishment was victorious last night in Democratic primaries for two congressional races.
In North Jersey’s 8th District, freshman Rep. Rob Menendez — the son of the embattled senator — easily defeated Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla. The mayor had argued that Menendez was too tainted by his father’s alleged corruption to serve
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