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Paul accused Booker of having an “imaginary friend,” referring to a story in the conservative National Review magazine that questioned whether T-Bone — a drug dealer Booker frequently talks about in stories — was real. A 2007 Star-Ledger story also cast doubt on the character’s veracity. “I’ve been reading a lot about Cory Booker’s imaginary friend and I wanted to come up there and see if New Jersey would elect real workers or someone with imaginary friends,” Paul said. Booker and Lonegan are running in the special Oct. 16 election to fill the remaining year-and-a-half of the late U.S. Sen....

Imagine a radio station that does an interview and a video of it goes viral on the Web. Of course, you would expect such a station to feature that video on its website, probably its front page. Well, radio station 1010 WINS in New York City had such a video but instead of featuring it, they completely ignored it despite the fact that the video was highlighted on such websites as the Drudge Report, the Daily Caller, and many others. As of this writing you won't find that video, which was originally posted on YouTube by tvnewsnj anywhere on the...

Cory Booker pocketed $689,500 in payouts from his former law firm while he served as Newark’s mayor and the firm pulled down millions in government contracts, he revealed Friday. Booker, the front-runner in the race for New Jersey’s US Senate seat, received the payments in annual allotments from 2007 to 2011. At the same time, the Trenk DiPasquale law firm held lucrative contracts with several local government agencies over which the mayor had influence — raking in more than $2 million in fees, records show. When questioned last month by The Post, Booker refused to say how much money he...

Gov. Chris Christie today delivered a strong endorsement of Republican Steve Lonegan, a former rival, for the U.S. Senate special election in October. Despite the fiery attacks the two have traded over the years, Christie pledged to help Lonegan on the fundraising circuit, on the stump, and by deploying two of his top surrogates on the campaign trail: Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno and interim U.S. Sen. Jeffrey Chiesa (R-N.J.), who is slated to endorse Lonegan on Wednesday. "We still have too many people across America who have too much government in too much of their lives," Christie told a jam-packed...

Gov. Chris Christie today will endorse Republican candidate Steve Lonegan, his former rival, for the U.S. Senate special election in October. Christie, who is running for re-election this year in the gubernatorial race, will appear with Lonegan today at the headquarters of the Hunterdon County Republican Committee to make his endorsement at 4 p.m. U.S. Sen. Jeffrey Chiesa (R-N.J.), Christie's pick to fill the seat temporarily after Sen. Frank Lautenberg's death in June, is slated to endorse Lonegan on Wednesday. The Christie endorsement -- coveted by GOP politicos across the country, including presidential candidate Mitt Romney last year -- marks...

The family of the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) on Monday endorsed Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D) in the New Jersey Senate race and criticized frontrunner Cory Booker (D) as a glory-seeking "show horse" who lacks their father's work ethic.

Newark Mayor Cory Booker officially launches his campaign for the U.S. Senate this morning, but before he was even out of the gate, the attacks against him had begun. Hours after Booker’s aides leaked the news yesterday that he will run in the special Senate primary in August to replace U.S. Frank Lautenberg who died this week, the National Republican Senatorial Committee sent out a blast email attacking the mayor’s celebrity status. "It remains to be seen whether Cory Booker the candidate can match Cory Booker’s celebrity persona in this kind of race, since campaigning is so much different from...

Over the last seven decades, 115 veterans of World War II have served in the United States Senate. This week, the last of them, Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, died. Two World War II veterans still serve in the House -- Ralph Hall of Texas, who was a Navy pilot, and John Dingell, who joined the Army at 18 and was scheduled to take part in the planned invasion of Japan. There aren't likely to be any more members of what Tom Brokaw labeled the Greatest Generation to serve in Congress. All surviving World War II veterans (except a few...

Five-term Democratic Sen. Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey passed away Monday from viral pneumonia. Lautenberg, the last World War II veteran in the Senate, had retired from the upper chamber in 2000, only to be drafted at the last minute in 2002 to replace... --snip-- So he has a bit of a dilemma here. Legislative leaders have to stand for re-election this year, so appointing one of them could create a vacancy in a pair of bodies where Republicans are already outnumbered. There is also an ideological dilemma. He could appoint a conservative, but having to run with him or...

In January, Geraldo Rivera said he was thinking of running in 2014 for Sen. Frank Lautenberg’s seat. Now, after the senator's passing, Gov. Chris Christie has the politically perilous task of naming a replacement. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) needs to pick a replacement for the Garden State’s Sen. Frank Lautenberg, who died Monday. As many pundits note, this is a task that’s fraught with political peril for Governor Christie: Pick someone deemed too liberal by conservatives, and he damages his presidential chances. Pick someone deemed too conservative by Democrats, and he damages his standing in his own blue-tinged...

Veteran journalist Geraldo Rivera said Monday he’d “take the call” if New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie wanted to appoint him to New Jersey’s vacant U.S. Senate seat, but acknowledged the chances of that seem slim. “I would definitely take the call,” Rivera said on the “Geraldo Rivera Radio Show.”

On the third-to-last day that Senator Frank Lautenberg ever voted in the Senate, he joined with 53 of his colleagues to support a compromise on new gun regulations. His vote wasn't enough. Now, Lautenberg's death makes the prospect of revisiting that issue — and a number of other Democratic priorities — substantially trickier. Take the gun legislation. The compromise proposal, which would have expanded background checks to include gun show and online sales, was part of a package that was postponed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid after the failed vote. It's expected to come back before the Senate at...

Sen. Frank Lautenberg died this morning of viral pneumonia at age 89, his office said

New Jersey’s U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg has been honored for his contributions to the Jewish community and Israel. The Democrat was feted Wednesday in New York at the annual gala for Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus life. …

2014 retirements: Dems heading for the hills By: Alexander Burns April 23, 2013 04:49 PM EDT Doesn’t anyone want to run for Senate in 2014? Midway through candidate recruitment season, the bad news for Democrats is this: They are watching a generation of talent leave the Senate and head for retirement. The less-bad news: So far, few marquee-name Republicans are interested in these seats either. When Montana Sen. Max Baucus called it quits on Tuesday, he became the latest in a long series of senior legislators to announce that they’ve had quite enough of life on the Hill. National Democrats...

Stopping veteran Dem retirements is top priority for Reid, SchumerBy Alexander Bolton - 11/25/12 06:00 AM ET One of the highest immediate political priorities for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Senate Democratic political guru Charles Schumer (N.Y.) is to persuade veteran colleagues not to retire in 2014. Democratic sources identify four senators as most likely to retire: Sens. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), Tim Johnson (D-S.D.), Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) and Tom Harkin (D-Iowa). Another possible veteran retirement is Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.), who has yet to announce his decision. But Democratic aides expect him to run...

The number of Americans filing new claims for jobless benefits fell last week to its lowest level in a month, an upbeat signal for a labor market that has struggled to create enough jobs. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 12,000 to a seasonally adjusted 365,000, the Labor Department said on Thursday. It was the first drop in new claims since the week that ended Aug. 4 and the lowest level since then as well.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. A dramatic beat by the ADP jobs number at 201k vs expectations of 140k is the third month in a row of beating expectations for jobs and the highest add of jobs in 5 months.

The other day our sister newspaper, the Gloucester County Times, reported on a raid at a fraternity house at Rowan University where — get ready for a shock — some college kids were drinking. About 100 of the kids were underage and will face charges. Believe it or not, that incident has its roots in the same problem that led to the controversy over the so-called "Bridge to Nowhere" in Alaska. That problem lies in the way the federal government distributes highway funding: poorly. It’s obvious in the case of the bridge that would have connected the city of Ketchikan,...

A top Republican has rejected the notion that Congress should re-examine the nation's gun laws after al Qaeda urged Muslims to attack America by exploiting loose firearm rules. Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said tightening gun laws to address the threat would be to surrender to terrorists at the expense of Americans' rights. “We’ve seen time and again that terrorists will use anything, including our own rights and freedoms, to plot attacks against innocent Americans,” Smith said in an email. “But simply because terrorists abuse our liberties doesn’t mean that we should limit the...