Written and distributed since 2003 by Donald Katz, Esq., Republican State Committeeman for Middlesex County and Counsel, Middlesex County Republican Organization
BENGIVENGA WINS MCRO CHAIRMANSHIP IN A LANDSLIDE
South Plainfield Councilman Robert Bengivenga, Jr. won the chairmanship of the Middlesex County Republican Organization at the reorganization meeting held at the Royal Albert’s Palace in the Fords section of Woodbridge on Tuesday, June 22nd, over Sharon Hubberman. The vote for Rob Bengivenga and his slate was 171 (68.4%) to 79 (31.6%) for Sharon Hubberman and her slate.
Elected as part of Rob’s slate were Sylvia Engel, (the incumbent Vice Chair and Edison GOP Chair) as First Vice Chair, Tonia (Antonia) Kulberda, (the incumbent Secretary, South Brunswick GOP Chair and Middlesex County Republican Women’s Club President) as Second Vice Chair, Harold Kane, (the incumbent Treasurer) as Treasurer, and Bryan Li, (the East Brunswick GOP First Vice Chair) as Secretary.
The MCRO Bylaws, with the changes described in my last newsletter, were almost unanimously adopted at the meeting. If you wish to read or download a copy of the bylaws, as adopted, you can do so on the MCRO website at middlesexgop.net, under the “About Us” section. Both the previous bylaws and the bylaws with the proposed changes were available for all to review on the website for several weeks before reorganization meeting vote and the county committee people were directed to the website address to allow them to review what was then the current MCRO bylaws as well as the bylaws with the then proposed changes in the official notice of the meeting mailed out on June 9th.
A MESSAGE FROM MCRO CHAIR ROB BENGIVENGA:
Dear MCRO Committee members and friends,
Last week I was humbled to have been elected as Chairman of the Middlesex County Republican Organization. I want to thank you for putting your trust in me and with your continued help, together we will build an organization that will work together to elect more Republicans countywide. I want to thank my predecessor Lucille Panos for her years of hard work and dedication to our party.
I also would like to congratulate the rest of the MCRO Executive board that you elected to serve with me. Sylvia Engel – 1st Vice Chair, Antonia Kulberda – 2nd Vice Chair, Bryan Li – Secretary, and Harold Kane – Treasurer.
As a five-term Councilman in a 2-1 Democrat town, I know that we can win. Over the next three years, our focus will be to build our local organizations, develop a strategic GOTV effort, aggressively fundraise and provide training to our local candidates. Together we can elect more Republicans from the bottom to the top of the ticket.
This next chapter begins now. In the coming days and weeks, you will hear more about events and plans to help us achieve victories in November and beyond.
Again, thank you for your support and I look forward to working with all of you over the next three years.
Sincerely,
Rob Bengivenga
MCRO Chair
POLITICAL TRIVIA:
Here are some political trivia questions. I hope you enjoy them. The answers are below, immediately above the calendar:
1. Which U.S. President had two beagles named Him and Her?
2. Who was the first foreign-born U.S. first lady since Louisa Adams, British-born wife of John Quincy Adams?
3. Who was the first unelected U.S. Vice President to assume the presidency?
4. Who was the only U.S. President to be elected to a third and a fourth term?
5. Who was the only U.S. President who had the Oath of Office administered to him by his father?
6. When was the first time that a U.S. President’s wife rode with her husband in the inaugural procession from the Capitol to the White House?
7. Who was the first Democratic U.S. President elected after the Civil War?
SUMMER PROJECTS AND ACTIVITIES
In the spirit of the summer reading lists many of us remember from our school days, here are some activities or projects you may want to consider for this summer:
* Committee people or others interested in organizing or strengthening their election districts might want to hold small backyard barbecues and invite their poll clerks and/or other Republicans in their district, who are prospects to help work for the Republican cause in their election district. Soft sales pitches permitted!
* Update your phone lists. Many of us have older lists of voters with phone numbers we have acquired or looked up at one time or another. Now, before the fall campaigns heat up – and you might want to call voters – why not get an up to date voter list and look up the phone numbers for those voters for whom you do not yet have phone numbers in your records – or which are not correct or are not on GOP Data Center? (This would similarly apply to updating other parts of your voter records.)
* This is also a good time to knock on the doors of houses without registered voters to find unregistered Republicans and register them and, of course, to find out if they need or want a vote by mail ballot.
* Any time is appropriate to knock on doors of the registered Republicans in your district to: a) find out if there is anyone else in the household who is unregistered (elderly parents coming to live with them, children who have just turned 18, etc.) and register them if they are likely to vote Republican; b) find out if they might help the Republicans in the fall campaign – if in no other way but to agree to have a sign on their lawn or a bumper sticker on their car, (assuming any campaign will have any bumper stickers!); c) find out if they need or want a vote by mail ballot. (Try hard to pitch “voting by mail” to the registered Republicans who only vote occasionally – this may be a way to get them to vote in a year when they otherwise usually don’t.); d) get more information about the voter. (Perhaps they will give you their unlisted phone number and/or their e-mail address, if you ask them in person, etc.)
* Attend the “Town Meetings” or similarly titled events, which may be held by the Democrat elected officials in our area, and ask them hard questions – with hard follow-ups.
* Visit the Middlesex County Fair and while you are there, spend some time helping out at the Republican booth.
* Find out if there are any street fairs or similar events coming up in your area, either during the summer or this fall, and help your local GOP municipal committee or the appropriate Republican candidates sign up for a booth/table and help work the booth.
* Write and send letters to the editor to the local newspapers and post them on social media, supporting our Republican candidates and Republican elected officials, or criticizing what the Democrats are doing. Considering what the Dems are doing, this should be easy. If you need some ideas, speak to any of our Republican candidates, who virtually all would love to see more letters to the editor printed or posted on social media.
FORWARDING OF MY NEWSLETTER ENCOURAGED – BUT A WORD OF CAUTION
I have always encouraged those of you receiving this newsletter to forward it to any Middlesex County Republican, or another individual, who you think might be interested in seeing it and many of you do that with regularity. However, when you do forward my newsletter, before you do so, you need to delete the option to unsubscribe from the newsletter from the bottom of the newsletter, since, if you don’t, anyone to whom you may forward the newsletter can unsubscribe you from my newsletter list and the way the MailChimp program works, there is a notice to me that the person unsubscribed and once I find out about the unsubscribe, there is only one chance to allow you to resubscribe and, if that is not done properly, I will never be able to add the e-mail you used back to my mailing list. Very recently, at least three different local GOP Chairs were unsubscribed from my newsletter by someone to whom it had been forwarded.
By all means, forward my newsletter, but make sure someone else doesn’t unsubscribe you!
FREE NAMETAGS FOR REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES IN MIDDLESEX COUNTY AVAILABLE
As previously reported, and as I have done for a number of years, I will be happy to make nametags for any Republican candidate running on the Republican line for public office in Middlesex County who wants one – for free. I have already made and distributed candidate nametags to most of the candidates who were on the ballot in the recent primary election, but there were also a number of candidates who were nominated by write-in vote who have not yet received a nametag.
If there is interest, their GOP municipal chair should send me an e-mail with the candidates’ information – including exactly the way each candidate wants his or her name on the nametag, plus his or her e-mail address, (and address and phone number), so I can add them to my e-mail newsletter list, and I will prepare the nametags.
ANSWERS TO POLITICAL TRIVIA:
1. Lyndon Johnson
2. Melania Trump, born in Slovenia
3. Gerald Ford, in 1974
4. Franklin D. Roosevelt, who was elected in 1932, 1936, 1940 and 1944
5. Calvin Coolidge, on August 3, 1923, after the death of President Warren G. Harding. The Oath of Office was administered to Coolidge by his father, a Vermont Justice of the Peace in his father’s home. Coolidge took the oath a second time, on August 17, 1923 in Washington, D.C.
6. On March 4, 1909, when Helen Taft rode with William Howard Taft
7. Grover Cleveland in 1884
UPDATED CALENDAR
What follows is an updated calendar. If you have any municipal or countywide fundraisers or functions you would like me to include in my e-mail calendar from time to time, please contact me at dkatzlaw@aol.com. Please note that organizations and campaigns sometimes provide added information, change dates, or cancel events, which information I include in this calendar if I receive the information in time. Therefore, if you plan to attend an event, please make sure you review the calendar listing in my latest e-mail and, to the extent you may not have pre-registered for the particular event so the sponsoring group will be able to contact you about any changes, you may want to check with the sponsoring group before you go, to make sure the information has not changed. Also, please be aware that these e-mails are not official MCRO notices or mailings; they are just something I do, voluntarily, to help our Republican Party.
July 14 (Wednesday 7:00 pm – 10:00 pm) – Reception supporting 18th LD Candidates: Vihal Patel, Angela Fam and Melanie McCann-Mott. The Estate at Farrington Lake, 16 Patrick Street, East Brunswick. $150.00 per person. Beer, wine, appetizers and buffet dinner. RSVP to fundraiser@flipthe18th.org.
July 26 (Monday) – Nomination petition filing deadline for School and Fire District Election Candidates running in the General Election.
July 28 (Wednesday) – Candidate Replacement Convention. Grace Reformed Church Fellowship Hall, 2815 Woodbridge Avenue, (entrance to parking lot is on Old Post Road), Edison. (Further details to be added later.)
August 2 (Monday) – August 8 (Sunday) – Middlesex County Fair at the Middlesex County Fair Grounds, Cranbury Road, East Brunswick. Volunteer at the Republican booth. All candidates running in Middlesex County are invited to campaign at the Republican booth. (Further details to be added later.)
August 9 (Monday 3:00 pm) – Drawing of ballot position for General Election Candidates by the County Clerk.
August 21 (Saturday 5:00 pm – 9:00 pm) – “Stories, Spirits, and Smokes” Sayreville GOP Fundraiser. Madison Park Volunteer Fire Company Hall, 3011 Cheesequake Road, Parlin. Tickets $75.00 per person and $25.00 additional for premium cigar bundle for those interested. Spend an evening sipping a cocktail, enjoying an expertly presented prime rib carving station and enjoying the entertaining stories that sound like someone’s been spying on your own family by Mike Farragher. Cash Bar, Butlered hors d’oeuvres, Prime Rib Carving Station, Pasta Dish, Coffee, Tea Cookies, Pastries, and more. Checks payable to Sayreville GOP to P.O. Box 1078, Sayreville, NJ 08871.
September 7 (Tuesday) – Last day vacancy can occur for primary election nominees for the General Election.
September 9 (Thursday) – Deadline for filling primary election nominee vacancy for the General Election.
September 18 (Saturday) – Statutory Deadline by which the County Clerk is supposed to start mailing out Vote By Mail (absentee) Ballots. (45 days before General Election Day)
October 12 (Tuesday) – Last day to register to vote in the General Election.
October 19 (Tuesday) – Deadline for filing your list of Election Day challengers for the General Election, with the Board of Elections (Middlesex County Board of Elections, 11 Kennedy Boulevard, East Brunswick, New Jersey 08816-1250.)
October 20 (Wednesday – Noon) – Statutory Deadline by which the County Clerk is supposed to mail out the Sample Ballots for the General Election.
October 23-October 31 – Early in person voting on voting machines (Number and location of voting sites not yet determined.)
October 26 (Tuesday) – Last day for vote by mail (absentee) ballot applications to be received by the County Clerk by mail in order to vote in General Election. (Middlesex County Clerk, P.O. Box 1110, 75 Bayard Street, 4th Floor, New Brunswick, New Jersey 08901-1110).
November 1 (Monday 3:00 pm) – Last day to apply for a vote by mail (absentee) ballot in person (or by authorized messenger) at the County Clerk’s office in order to vote in the General Election.
November 2 (Tuesday) – General Election
