Sweeney dismisses Lautenberg statement as ‘uninformed and vengeful,’ while Christie likens north Jersey Democrats to ‘pigs at a trough’ — and that’s for starters
By Colleen O’Dea
Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester)
The proposed takeover of Rutgers’ Camden campus by Rowan University has sparked off something of a Civil War in New Jersey — and kicked off the 2014 campaign for one of the state’s seats in the U.S. Senate.
In response to a request by U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), that the federal education secretary review the potential merger, Sen. President Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester) — a possible challenger to Lautenberg — and the entire South Jersey Democratic delegation blasted the state’s elder senator yesterday for making “uninformed and vengeful remarks” about the plan.
“They are utterly false, as well as offensive to the many people giving their time and effort to an initiative that would greatly improve higher education in our region,” read the statement. It was signed by six Democratic senators and 12 Assembly members in the 1st through 7th legislative districts. Other signatories included Republican Sen. Diane Allen of the 7th and Sen. Dawn Marie Addiego of the 8th, as well as Camden Mayor Dana Redd and three other South Jersey mayors.
That statement prompted a North Jersey Democratic Assemblywoman to defend the 88-year-old Lautenberg, who has spent 28 of the past 30 years in the Senate, and bring Gov. Chris Christie into the fray.
“There are far too many questions swirling around the merger of Rutgers-Camden and Rowan for them not to be asked,” said Assemblywoman Connie Wagner (D-Bergen) and a member of the Joint Higher Education Committee that held hearings on the proposed restructuring of higher education that Christie is pushing.
“As a state,” said Wagner, “we have not funded higher education to the level that it deserves. While South Jersey legislators fight for their schools, north Jersey legislators are called ‘pigs’ for stating the simple fact that we need more money for these institutions as well.”
Christie likened Bergen County’s three Democratic senators, who said they would not support the proposed merger without a $2 billion higher education bond issue, to “pigs at the trough.” (The plan would give parts of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey to Rutgers in exchange for Rutgers giving its Camden campus to Rowan.)
Not to be left out, George E. Norcross III, chairman of Cooper University Hospital and the South Jersey political power many believe to be behind the Rowan-Rutgers plan, issued a statement of his own, about an hour after Wagner’s, criticizing Lautenberg.
More>>
