| Tom Kean Jr.’s local editorial board has published a blistering criticism of the Congressman after a New York Times reporter was denied entry and had the cops called on them at his recent campaign event.
The My Central Jersey Editorial Board writes that Kean Jr. is once again “running an elusive campaign,” and that any suggestion that he is accessible to the local media is “astonishingly removed from reality” and “an insult to the intelligence of 7th District voters.”
The editorial also criticizes Kean Jr. for appearing with Howard Lutnick in the first place, writing: “if you lie with dogs, you wake up with fleas.”
They conclude by writing that NJ-07 deserves a “congressman who is more than a loyal backbencher who simply goes along to get along.”
Read key segments from the editorial for yourself:
- Tom Kean Jr., the stealth congressman who has shied away from in-person town halls and avoided public appearances during his four years in Congress, is again running an elusive campaign as he did in 2022 and 2024.
- Kean’s avoidance of the public and lack of transparency became a national issue earlier this year when he was absent from Congress for nearly four months while seeking treatment for depression. It was not a surprise to voters in the 7th District, who had become accustomed to Kean’s seemingly innate reticence.
- Whenever he makes a campaign stop, the press becomes aware of it only after the fact. Two years ago, we sent a bright summer intern to an innocuous event at the Somerville YMCA where Kean was announcing a grant. When the intern attempted to ask Kean a question, he was quickly shunned by aides as if he were wearing a scarlet “P” for press on his shirt.
- Two incidents last week showed that his handlers’ deliberate strategy of keeping Kean in a protective bubble is not only continuing but is becoming more aggressive and has taken a ludicrous turn.
- On Thursday, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick visited Magna-Power Electronics in Raritan Township with Kean, a routine campaign stop. Of course, like most, if not all, events on Kean’s campaign schedule, the press was not notified of the visit until a press release from the Department of Commerce arrived at 4:30 p.m. Friday, the traditional time for a bad-news dump.
- And why would Kean want to be seen smiling next to Lutnick, one of the president’s merry and greedy band of yes-men, who embarrassed himself with fumbling answers about his relationship to Jeffrey Epstein and his sons’ involvement with the president’s sons in a deal, allegedly negotiated by their parents, involving a mining company in Kazakhstan?
- Politics make strange bedfellows and, as the old proverb says, if you lie with dogs, you wake up with fleas, especially in a campaign where your opponents are emphasizing the apparent appearance of corruption throughout the administration.
- On Friday, a New York Times reporter tried to enter a breakfast fundraiser for Kean featuring Speaker of the House Mike Johnson at a Warren County country club […] A Kean aide denied the Times reporter entry to the event while Fox News and a Lehigh Valley television station were given access.
- Complicating the situation was that someone called local police to report a trespasser, the Times reporter, who was waiting in the parking lot to speak to either Kean or Johnson.
- The New York Times story apparently prompted Kean, or one of his handlers, to post a comment on social media that was arrogant and puzzling, a statement astonishingly removed from reality.
- Those social media posts are an insult to the intelligence of 7th District voters who have experienced firsthand for the last four years the almost aristocratic distance that Kean has maintained from public appearances and the press.
- 7th District voters deserve to hear from Kean himself, his unfiltered views on the issues that matter most to them and how much he supports a president with dismal approval ratings.
- He must demonstrate in the next two months that he has the courage and gumption to be an independent advocate for the 7th District and dare to stand up to a party and a president whose policies have become increasingly unpopular and out of touch with the everyday lives of Central Jersey residents. Voters in the 7th District want a congressman who is more than a loyal backbencher who simply goes along to get along.
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