Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla will challenge Rep. Rob Menendez for the Eighth District’s House seat in next year’s Democratic primary, the mayor announced Tuesday.
Bhalla, in a video announcement, said the nation is “at a pivotal moment,” and he pledged to focus on environmental issues, reproductive rights, and health care if elected to Congress. But he also referenced Menendez and the congressman’s father, Sen. Bob Menendez, a Democrat who is facing federal corruption charges.
“I believe that America is better than the demagogues who seek to divide us or the politicians who strive only to serve themselves,” Bhalla said to images of both the elder and younger Menendez.
The mayor’s announcement comes at a time of shifting fortunes in Hudson County.
Though Democratic county officials have pulled support from Sen. Menendez following his September indictment, they endorsed the younger Menendez’s reelection bid earlier this month.
The party’s endorsement means Bhalla would face an uphill battle against one of the state’s staunchest Democratic machines.
Rep. Menendez welcomed Bhalla to race by touting his own record, including a bill meant to combat noise pollution from helicopter tours launching from the East side of the Hudson River, and dinging Bhalla over Hoboken’s famously fractious politics.
“While we have advocated tirelessly for Hoboken, it seems the only reason Ravi has entered the race after endorsing me in 2022 and publicly applauding our work this year is because a week after losing control of the city council, he sees no political future for himself in Hoboken,” Menendez said.
The Eighth District is overwhelmingly Democratic. The winner of June’s Democratic primary is expected to win handily in November.
The two-term Hoboken mayor served eight years on Hoboken’s City Council before ascending to its highest post in 2018. Before entering politics, he was a civil rights attorney.
“This moment requires change that is momentous. I believe that health care is a human right. Housing is a human right. Reproductive rights are human rights,” Bhalla said in his announcement video. “The climate crisis is not a predetermined catastrophe, but a challenge we can and must meet.”
If elected, Bhalla would be the first turbaned Sikh elected to Congress and only the second Sikh sent to the nation’s capital. Bhalla, who was New Jersey’s first Sikh mayor, was subject to attack mailers calling him a terrorist during his 2017 mayoral campaign.
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