Labor fights Democrat in race with record-breaking spending

TRENTON » A teachers union that is typically a reliable Democrat ally is spending millions of dollars to help a Donald Trump-supporting Republican try to unseatNew Jersey’s top-ranking Democrat, a union leader himself.

The New Jersey Education Associationhas spent roughly $4.5 million to try to take out Democratic Senate President Steve Sweeney, who faces a challenge in Tuesday’s election from a former Republican town councilman in a suburban Philadelphia district that narrowly voted for Trump last year.

Sweeney and his supporters have responded by spending nearly $10 million in the race againstFranGrenier.Themore than $15million total spent on the race so far makes it the most expensive state Senate race in state history, according to the Election Law Enforcement Commission.

Asvotersprepare tochoose Gov. Chris Christie’s replacement Tuesday, those in the Philadelphia media market also have been greeted by an onslaught of bitter and misleading or incorrect attack ads fromthe senate race.

The campaign from the state’s largest teachers union sparkedby adispute overpensionpaymentshas alsodriven a wedge between Democrats and the union, which previouslyspentmillionsofdollars to help increase the party’s majorities in the Legislature. The union also supported Sweeney in 2013.

“If Democrats are disappointed that our members did not endorse Steve Sweeney this year, they need to take another look at Sweeney’s record of broken promises,” NJEA President Marie Blistan said.

Garden State Forward, the union’s political group, is airing an ad attacking Sweeney for being “caught spending” $100,000 on dinners and cigars, but the claim leaves out context andappears to get the dollar figure wrong.

The ad relies on a 2011 Associated Press article to support its claim, but that report says Sweeney spent $765 on cigars, $1,118 for dinner at a Washington restaurant and more than $10,000 for political meetings.

The money came from Sweeney’s Gloucester County freeholder re-election fund, a positionhehadresignedfrom. NewJersey election lawallows former candidates to keep their accounts open as long as they report on their financial activity, as Sweeney did.

A political group backing Sweeneyhas spent about$2.6 millionsofar, according to the election commission.

New Jerseyans for a Better Tomorrow has financed an ad that says Grenier was on theWoodstown council when property taxes went up. The ad misses the fact that property taxes across the statehave risenabout2percentannually and also misses that school boards set property tax rates alongwith town councils.