Move over, Andy Kim and Tammy Murphy.
Parsippany resident Ken Kaplan is joining a field of political heavyweights in the race to replace Bob Menendez in the U.S. Senate.
Kaplan, a commercial real estate broker, was nominated by acclamation last Sunday by the New Jersey Libertarian Party and needs only 800 petition signatures to get his name on the November ballot.
A veteran underdog of state campaigns, Kaplan, 76, has represented the party in previous New Jersey elections for the Senate and the governor’s office. He said he went to the Libertarian convention in New Brunswick last weekend with no plans to run.
“It was a surprise to me,” he said.
The New Jersey Libertarian Party had 24,438 members in 2023, state records show. That’s a fraction of the registered Democrats (2,547,517) and Republicans (1,555,014) in the state but significantly more than any other party. There were almost 2.4 million unaffiliated voters registered in 2023, according to the state.
Three times in race for governor
A graduate of Brandeis University and NYU Law School, Kaplan finished third with 7,935 votes in the 1993 race for the governor’s office, when Republican Christine Todd Whitman bested incumbent Jim Florio to become New Jersey’s first female governor.
Kaplan ran again in 2009 and 2013, losing both times to Chris Christie and receiving a high of 12,155 votes in 2013. Between those campaigns, he ran for the U.S. Senate in 2012, finishing third behind Menendez with 16,803 votes.
With a certified…
