Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattrelli clashed during their final debate of the New Jersey governor’s race Wednesday night, with each chiding the other, “Shame on you” in heated exchanges.
The tense debate underscores how personal the race has become with just a few weeks until voters head to the polls. Both parties view the New Jersey contest as competitive, and they are watching this year’s gubernatorial races in both New Jersey and Virginia for early signs of how voters around the country are reacting to President Donald Trump’s administration.
The sharpest exchange came after Sherrill said Ciattarelli “made his millions by working with some of the worst offenders and saying that opioids were safe.” The Sherrill campaign then circulated a NJ Advance Media story from 2021 that noted Ciattarelli’s company produced “continuing education materials” for universities, funded largely by pharmaceutical companies, which critics described as “advertising.” The report noted that some of the materials “appeared to downplay the dangers of opioids.”
“Shame on you,” Ciattarelli responded, to which Sherill said, “Shame on you, sir.”
Ciattarelli went on to blame the fentanyl crisis on President Joe BIden’s “open border” policies, adding that Sherrill’s comment about his company was “a lie.”
“I got to walk at my college graduation,” Ciattarelli quipped as Sherrill spoke, referencing reports that Sherrill was barred from walking at her graduation from the U.S. Naval Academy amid a widespread cheating scandal that year. Sherrill has said she could not walk because she refused to turn in fellow classmates, and she has sharply criticized the Ciattarelli campaign for circulating largely unredacted copies of her military records.
“I think you’re trying to divert from the fact that you killed tens of thousands of people by printing your misinformation, your propaganda, and then getting paid to develop an app so that people could more easily get the opioids once they were addicted,” Sherrill said. “Families across the state deserve to know more about that.”
“The difference between me and the congresswoman: I got to walk at my college graduation. I’ve never broken the law,” Ciattarelli said, pointing to a fine Sherrill paid a fine in 2022 for being late to disclose two sales of stocks related to her husband’s work. Sherrill has said she does not own or trade individual stocks herself, having sold them in 2020.
As they sparred, Ciattarelli appeared to whistle and added, “Getting desperate.”
Earlier in the debate, Ciattarelli accused Sherrill of hiding her involvement in the cheating scandal, calling on her to release her disciplinary records.
“I think she was punished for something else, and so I think she needs to come clean. I think the people in New Jersey deserve an answer as to why she was punished at the Naval Academy,” Ciattarelli said. Sherrill said she does not want to give the Ciattarelli campaign access to her classmates’ records.
The candidates also sparred over President Donald Trump and his policies, with Ciattarelli giving Trump an “A” grade for his presidency while Sherrill gave Trump an “F.”
“I think he’s right about everything that he’s doing. He has secured the border and the economy. We’ve got — inflation is much lower than it was when Joe Biden was in the White House,” said Ciattarelli, who has Trump’s endorsement.
However, earlier in the night, Ciattarelli declined to say whether he considered himself part of the “MAGA movement,” instead saying, “I’m part of a New Jersey movement.”
Sherrill, meanwhile, criticized Trump administration policies, saying they will drive up costs and that she would join a lawsuit challenging the president’s tariff policies on her first day in office.
Sherrill also accused Ciattarelli of failing to stand up to Trump, including the administration’s recent decision to freeze federal funds for a tunnel project connecting New York and New Jersey.
“Jack won’t say one cross word about the president, even when he froze Gateway tunnel funding,” Sherrill said.
Ciattarelli placed the blame for the frozen funding on the ongoing government shutdown, but he added, “This shutdown would have to go on for two or three months before the Gateway project would grind to a halt.”
Sherrill also criticized the Trump administration’s deployment of National Guard troops to U.S. cities as illegal and “unacceptable.”
Ciattarelli said he has told Trump “you’ll never have to worry about New Jersey” if he is elected, because he would make New Jersey “a law and order state again.”
The candidates were asked to grade Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy’s performance — with Sherrill giving him a “B,” praising his work on pensions but calling for more to be done to address high costs, access to housing and transportation.
Ciattarelli gave Murphy an “F,” calling Murphy’s tenure “the worst governorship of our lifetime” and blaming him for crises in affordability, public education, public safety and overdevelopment.
The pair also faced off over taxes, rising electricity costs, immigration and abortion.