NJ Assembly Primary Spending Hit New High In 2025

By Nikita Biryukov, New Jersey Monitor

October 11, 2025

June’s legislative primaries were the most expensive in state history, the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission announced Monday.

Assembly candidates and outside spending groups backing their bids poured nearly $30.7 million into the races, eclipsing the previous spending record reached in 2015, when candidates and outside groups spent $18.3 million on primaries after adjustments for inflation.

All 80 Assembly seats are on the ballot this year. State Senate seats are not up for grabs until 2027.

Commission officials credited contribution limits that rose dramatically under a 2023 law for the increase.

The Elections Transparency Act doubled the maximum donation to candidates to $5,200, from $2,600, and the commission raised those limits to $5,500 under a provision of the act that requires the state to account for inflation every two years.

The surge of Assembly candidacies this year also contributed to higher spending totals, the commission said. This year, 209 individuals filed to run for Assembly, the most since 252 people ran in 1977.

Though seven of those candidates were knocked off the ballot as a result of challenges to their nominating petitions, the 202 that ran this year still far outnumbered candidates in recent Assembly cycles. Assembly races between 2015 and 2023 averaged 177 candidacies, the commission said.

Each of the 10 most expensive Assembly primaries was contested on at least one side.

District spending peaked at nearly $2.8 million in the 19th District, where Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin (D-Middlesex) and Assemblywoman Yvonne Lopez (D-Middlesex) faced a long-shot challenge from social worker Michelle Burwell.

Candidates and outside groups spent more than $2.5 million in the 32nd District. There, an insurgent slate led by Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla (D) and former New Jersey Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency chief of staff Katie Brennan (D) beat out county-backed challengers and incumbent Assemblywoman Jessica Ramirez (D-Hudson).

Together, the state’s 10 most expensive Assembly primaries accounted for just over half of all spending on the lower-chamber races, or just under $16 million.

Outside spending on legislative primaries also reached a new peak. Independent expenditure groups put about $2.7 million into this year’s Assembly primaries, eclipsing the $2.3 million record reached in 2021’s primaries, which included primaries for both legislative chambers.

New Jersey holds Assembly elections in every odd-numbered year. Senators serve a four-year term or a two-year term for elections held at the start of the decade. Senators elected in 2027 will serve for four years, and those elected in 2031 will serve for two.

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