The Case Against Tom Kean Jr.

Kean Jr. Is A Self-Serving Career Politician Who Has Enriched Himself While Hurting New Jersey

Before being sworn into office, Tom Kean Jr. promised that he would bring the “highest level of ethics and transparency” to Congress. Kean Jr. explicitly pledged to ban congressional stock trading and told New Jersey voters they “deserve a Congressman that you can trust” in a TV ad. Then Kean Jr. got to Washington and changed his tune.

On top of promising to ban congressional stock trading, Kean Jr. also made an explicit promise to place his millions of dollars of assets into a blind trust. But Kean Jr. has broken both of those promises. Kean Jr. has traded hundreds of thousands of dollars of stocks this Congress alone, and has “backed away from” his vow to place his assets into a blind trust to prevent the possibility of using insider information to influence his portfolio. New Jerseyans have seen and heard about Kean Jr.’s corruption in the local press, demonstrating that it is becoming a major vulnerability for him on the campaign trail.

Kean Jr.’s stock trading also drew attention when it was revealed that he made multiple market moves while simultaneously missing votes in Washington. Financial disclosures revealed that Kean Jr. “bought and sold shares of eight different stocks between March 10 and March 31” of 2026 – the same period of time that Kean Jr. was MIA from his job. Kean Jr. then filed a second stock trading disclosure revealing even more market moves during his absence. Reporting confirmed that Kean Jr. “personally certified the disclosure, affixing his digital signature to the document on April 13,” tying him directly to the trading activity. While Kean Jr. was playing the stock market, he missed dozens of votes and refused to be transparent with his constituents about where he was and why he was not able to vote in Washington. Kean Jr. even signed off on reimbursing travel perks for his staff while he refused to tell his constituents why he was missing from the job. That’s the story of Kean Jr.’s time in Washington: while he serves himself and plays by a different set of rules, his own community is left to pay the price.

Rebecca Bennett isn’t a career politician, and she has a plan to take on a broken and corrupt Washington. Rebecca doesn’t take a dime of corporate PAC money and will fight to follow through on her pledge to ban congressional stock trading. She does not own individual stocks – even before she gets to Washington – because she knows how important it is for elected officials to serve the public, not their portfolio.

Kean Jr. Has Betrayed New Jersey By Putting Trump and His Donors First

Tom Kean Jr.’s father earned a reputation as a commonsense leader who put New Jersey first. Unfortunately, Kean Jr. has not followed in his father’s footsteps and has become a party-loyalist in the MAGA era. In Washington, Kean Jr. has put allegiance to Donald Trump, his party bosses, and his special interest donors ahead of his own community – repeatedly selling out New Jersey to the highest bidder. 

Kean Jr. has voted with Trump 100 percent of the time this Congress. And when Kean Jr.’s own constituents – including local Republicans – have spoken up and begged their congressman to advocate for them, he has instead chosen to actively harm his own community. The all-Republican led council of Roxbury publicly criticized Kean Jr. for refusing to speak out against a proposed ICE detention facility that received broad, bipartisan opposition locally. They wrote in a blistering statement: “Despite repeated outreach, our federal representative did not engage to the level we had hoped to provide the advocacy our residents deserved.” It’s the same pattern Kean Jr. demonstrated when he refused to call out Trump by name when the president withheld funding for the Gateway Tunnel, putting the critical infrastructure project and New Jersey commuters at risk, and putting good-paying union jobs on the line.

Even those who know Kean Jr. best admit that he has failed to put New Jersey first. A longtime friend of Kean Jr. and veteran Republican strategist told POLITICO that the vulnerable congressman is in deep trouble because he “has not separated himself from a president who is deeply unpopular at home.” The New York Times dubbed Kean Jr. “a Republican in a squeeze” as he continued to put Trump ahead of his own constituents.

In addition to following Trump’s marching orders, Kean Jr. does the bidding of his special interest donors. Kean Jr. “has received more than $100,000 in contributions from utility companies and their political action committees over his roughly 25-year political career.” Kean Jr. voted to roll back commonsense energy tax credits and jack up electricity bills for New Jersey families. Skyrocketing utility bills are a major issue in the Garden State, and Kean Jr. is part of the problem.

With a record of selling out his own community, it’s no surprise why Kean Jr. “has not held an in-person gathering since beginning his congressional term in 2023.” He has gone to extreme lengths to avoid answering for his record, including having consistently “avoided or refused questions and interviews from reporters.”

While Kean Jr. betrays New Jersey, Rebecca Bennett has always put service to country over service to self. In the Navy, Rebecca led in some of the most challenging environments in the world. She is not interested in benefiting herself or falling in line with D.C. party bosses – her North Star has always been and always will be protecting and serving her community.

Kean Jr. Has Ripped Away Health Care and Jacked Up Costs on New Jersey Families

Tom Kean Jr. lied to New Jersey families when he promised he would protect their health care and lower costs in Congress. He’s done the opposite.

Kean Jr. “bet big” on Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill when he cast a decisive vote to make the largest cuts to health care and food assistance in history – all so that he could fund tax cuts for billionaires. As a result of Kean Jr.’s decision to side with Trump, health care premiums have skyrocketed for New Jersey families. What has Kean Jr.’s big bet brought back to New Jersey? The distinct honor of being “dead last” in the country in funding for rural health care.

Kean Jr. has long been an opponent of health care access for New Jersey families, especially for women. In Washington, Kean Jr. has voted to punish doctors who provide abortions with criminal penalties and worked with extremists in the House to pass two bills that chip away at women’s constitutional freedoms and deny them access to essential reproductive health care. When given the opportunity to codify Roe v. Wade nationwide, he sided with anti-abortion politicians who believe they should control women’s reproductive health care decisions – just like he did in Trenton. And Kean Jr. has done nothing to stand up to Robert Kennedy Jr. as he undermines safe and effective childhood vaccines.

When Kean Jr. isn’t voting to rip away care, he’s voting to raise prices. While they proudly do not pump their own gas, New Jersey families are very much feeling the squeeze when they fill up their tank because of Kean Jr.’s support for a reckless war in Iran. Kean Jr. supports spending billions of dollars overseas while New Jersey families are left to foot the bill.  And Kean Jr. has voted multiple times to support sweeping tariffs that are jacking up costs on everything from groceries to housing.

As a mom raising two young kids in New Jersey, the fight to lower costs is personal for Rebecca. She and her husband know what it’s like to sit down at the kitchen table and open up their utility bill, shocked at how high the price has jumped. Rebecca has a plan to make child care more affordable for working families, and she’s going to fight to roll back Kean Jr. and Trump’s devastating health care cuts and reckless tariffs that have made everything more expensive. Her promise is simple: she will fight as hard for New Jersey families in Congress as she fights for her own.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING

NJ.com: Wealthy N.J. congressman promised saintly ethics. He chose getting richer instead, rivals say. [NJ.com, 7/23/25]

Tom Kean Jr. pledged not to be anything like the politician he had defeated. The incoming Republican congressman said he would bring the “highest level of ethics and transparency” to Washington, D.C., after winning a hotly contested election in 2022. Kean would move his millions in personal assets into a blind trust, he promised a day before taking office […] Yet two years later, Kean has backed away from that vow… 

NJ Spotlight News: Rep. Tom Kean faces scrutiny over his stock portfolio [NJ Spotlight News, 7/25/25]

Kean, a Republican, promised to put his assets in a blind trust. But after nearly three years representing New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District, Kean […] has not yet moved his portfolio into a blind trust… 

NOTUS: Rep. Tom Kean Jr. Has Disappeared From Capitol Hill. He’s Still Trading Stocks [NOTUS, 4/24/26]

Stock trading has been a theme across Kean’s career in Congress.

American Journal News: New Jersey Rep. Tom Kean Jr.’s stock trades continue to draw scrutiny [American Journal News, 7/13/25]

POLITICO: Trump is causing a midterm headache for this New Jersey congressmember [POLITICO, 3/2/26]

Even a person close to the two-term congressmember acknowledged that Kean has not separated himself from a president who is deeply unpopular at home… 

The New York Times: “A Republican in a squeeze” [The New York Times, 2/25/26]

Representative Thomas Kean Jr.’s re-election fight was never expected to be easy. A second-term Republican, Kean represents an affluent swing district in New Jersey that backed Gov. Mikie Sherrill, a Democrat, over her Trump-endorsed opponent by about two points. But in the past month, the Trump administration has made Kean’s re-election effort in the Seventh Congressional District significantly more complicated.

Associated Press: Tom Kean Jr.’s political roots date to 1776. Is that enough to protect the Republican’s House seat? [Associated Press, 3/22/26]

The Republican congressman is among his party’s most endangered members as Democrats try to capitalize on President Donald Trump’s unpopularity and regain control of the U.S. House.

POLITICO: Gatewaygate [POLITICO, 1/28/26]

So who could this controversy I hereby dub Gatewaygate hurt besides New Jersey commuters, the thousands of workers on the project and the regional economy in general? The political career of U.S. Rep. Tom Kean Jr., who’s facing an electorate that quickly turned on Trump. 

New Jersey Globe: Gateway funding battle could become albatross for N.J. Republicans in 2026 races [New Jersey Globe, 2/13/26]

Kean, who declined an interview for this story, has not singled out Trump, nor did he sign onto a letter led by his Democratic colleagues in New York and New Jersey calling for a reinstatement of the Gateway funds.

New Jersey 101.5: Roxbury Republicans erupt over new ICE detention center, pressure Kean [New Jersey 101.5, 2/24/26]

The council officials called out, by name, U.S. Rep. Tom Kean Jr., R-N.J. 7th District. […] the local Republicans said Kean hadn’t done enough to defend Roxbury. “Despite repeated outreach, our federal representative, Congressman Tom Kean Jr., did not engage to the level we had hoped to provide the advocacy our residents deserved,” township officials said.

NJ.com: Kean blasted for vote cutting Medicaid, putting at least 450,000 in N.J. at risk [NJ.com, 5/16/25]

U.S. Rep. Tom Kean Jr.‘s committee vote Wednesday to make significant cuts to the Medicaid program sparked an angry response far and wide…

New Jersey Globe: Kean bets big on Trump’s “beautiful bill” in high-stakes vote [New Jersey Globe, 7/3/25]

Rolling Stone: Vulnerable Republicans Are Claiming They Love Medicaid After Voting to Gut It [Rolling Stone, 8/8/25]

In Kean Jr.’s district, at least 6,000 individuals are expected to lose Medicaid coverage as a result of the legislation, and over 450,000 individuals are at risk throughout the state.

The Washington Post: Democrats step up efforts to woo military veterans ahead of midterms [The Washington Post, 7/5/25]

Rebecca Bennett was addressing about 30 voters, many of them veterans she knew from her work in the community, in a gaming store owned by one of her supporters that featured bookshelves lined with board games such as “Eldritch Horror” and “Lost Ruins of Arnak.” Bennett was trying to explain what serving in Congress has in common with her service as a Navy helicopter pilot. “If you don’t land exactly where you need to, you’re going to crash and people are going to die,” she said. “The stakes were life and death then, and they are life and death now.” 

The New York Times: In Battle for House, Democrats Are Calling Up Military Recruits [The New York Times, 8/3/25]

“We saw this in 2018, that specifically female veterans and women with national security backgrounds are uniquely positioned at being able to flip seats red to blue,” said Rebecca Bennett, a former Navy helicopter pilot and a member of the Hellcats chat. Ms. Bennett is running to unseat Representative Tom Kean Jr., a New Jersey Republican.

The 19th News: Meet the Hell Cats — a key to Democrats’ hopes of taking the House [The 19th News, 2/11/26]

“I’m the kind of person that runs at problems, and I just had to do everything I could to stand up and fight for this country because I love it,” said Bennett, a former U.S. Navy helicopter pilot and mother of two daughters. “For me, this is about continuing to serve our country in a new capacity, but really it’s about fighting for the version of the country that I want to leave for my daughters.” Bennett, a Democrat, is running in a competitive race to unseat Republican Thomas Kean Jr. in New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District. Her platform prioritizes affordability, health care and national security.

Reuters: Could a group of women veteran ‘Hellcats’ help Democrats flip the House in 2026? [Reuters, 12/22/25]

“I have led missions in some of the most challenging environments that exist on this earth, led missions in the middle of the ocean, in the middle of the night, where there’s no margin for error, and I got the job done every single time,” said Bennett, 38.

InsiderNJ: Patriot, Navy Veteran, Bennett Offers Mission Critical Mindset for Showdown with Kean [Insider NJ, 12/16/25]

Jewish Insider: From the Strait of Hormuz to the halls of Congress: Rebecca Bennett aims to take on Rep. Tom Kean Jr. [Jewish Insider, 8/7/25]

New Jersey Globe: Bennett raises over $700k in Q1, her largest NJ-7 fundraising quarter yet [New Jersey Globe, 4/1/26]

Ex-Navy helicopter pilot has raised nearly $2.7 million in red-to-blue race

PATH TO VICTORY
New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District is one of the best pickup opportunities for Democrats in 2026. A suburban, highly educated swing district, voters across its six counties are increasingly exhausted by the hyper-partisanship and extreme policy agenda driven by House Republicans in Washington. Tom Kean Jr. is highly vulnerable and has done nothing to separate himself from a deeply unpopular president who New Jersey voters are quickly souring on.

The political tides have already shifted in the Garden State. The first signs of growing momentum came in the November 2025 gubernatorial election, where Mikie Sherrill decisively won the governor’s mansion and carried NJ-07 by a 2-point margin. Her performance represented a nearly 15-point swing from the 2021 gubernatorial in the district. Sherrill’s strong performance led nonpartisan race raters like Cook Political Report to move NJ-07 from Lean R to Toss Up. Independents are increasingly breaking away from the Republican brand as Kean Jr’s favorability ratings dip underwater because he has rubber-stamped Trump’s agenda. A mysterious absence and brutal headlines have only made Kean Jr. even more vulnerable.

At a time when voters are clamoring for change and frustrated with a broken Washington, Kean Jr.’s more than two-decade long political career is no longer a positive attribute. Propelled by an incredibly strong midterm environment and a double-digit Democratic advantage on the national generic ballot, NJ-07 is fully primed to reject out-of-touch and corrupt incumbent Kean Jr. in November.

New Jersey voters are ready to send an independent voice to Washington who fights for them and their community, not for party bosses. That’s why Rebecca Bennett will flip this seat and voters will fire Kean Jr. in November.