The American Civil Liberties Union threw a wrinkle into the New Jersey governor's race yesterday and gave some new ammunition to Republican Chris Christie's opponents.

The ACLU, through a federal lawsuit, obtained Department of Justice documents showing that Christie, as U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, authorized tracking suspects through their cell phones without obtaining a warrant.

"Big Brother is tucked away in our cell phones, and the man behind the curtain is Chris Christie," said Deborah Jacobs, executive director of the ACLU's New Jersey chapter.

The practice isn't illegal, though, and Christie told The Star-Ledger he had obtained court approval for the tracking. In 66 of the 79 instances of tracking done by the New Jersey U.S. Attorney's office, including some before and after Christie took office, the tracking by the led to criminal prosecutions, according to the Justice department.

Christie told the Ledger that the criticism was "overblown."

"Every time that technology was used, it was with court authorization," he said. "That's the standard. There was no policy in place that said to us you have to get a search warrant."

But his leading Republican opponent, Steve Lonegan, said the actions go against conservative principles of limited government and privacy rights.

And if Christie makes it to the general election against Gov. Corzine, expect the issue to come back up as well. Democrats have already been trying to tie Christie to former President Bush, and this information could easily be linked, in a campaign, to the former president's controversial wire-tapping programs. Even if Christie's answers satisfy voters, it's never good for a politician to have to explain himself on an issue this heated.

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Call it the Wayne Bryant rule.

The Election Law Enforcement Commission has explicitly barred all lawmakers and other public officials from using their campaign accounts to pay for their legal defenses. Bryant, the formerly powerful state Senator from Camden County, had asked to use his campaign fund to pay for his defense in his corruption trial and was denied. The new rule codifies that decision.

Former Senators Sharpe James and Joseph Coniglio had just gone ahead and used their campaign accounts without asking permission and were not stopped because ELEC generally doesn't take action unless there is a specific complaint filed.

The new rule, however, appears to pro-actively bar anyone else from using their campaign funds for legal defenses. ELEC ruled that corruption defenses are not an "ordinary and necessary" part of an officials' duties. Even in New Jersey.

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Sen. Robert Menendez (D., N.J.), said it's possible Congress will approve more stimulus spending next year, if the economy has not turned around by then.

"If we see the economy still challenged, then there may very well be an appetite for it," Menendez said Monday in a wide-ranging round table with Trenton reporters.

He said one lesson from past economic downturns "is that being meek, ultimately created a longer depression, being bold is what is necessary . . . There’s already a discussion right now even as the stimulus package unfolds as to whether or not we will need another stimulus package."
 

Gov. Corzine's new budget plan counts on $2.2 billion in stimulus aid, potentially leaving a deficit next year once that money runs out, but he has said it's possible the federal government will again provide help if tax revenues don't recover.

Menendez also said health care reform could start moving through Congress this summer, with a floor vote possible in September. He said that right now the plans for changes exist in only broad outlines.

"The goal will be to have a health care system that has coverage for all, creates affordability, ensures access for all and that does so in both a public and private way," Menendez said.

One idea for paying for the program would be rolling back tax cuts for couples earning $250,000 and up. Another idea - which Menendez said he opposes - would limit tax deductions for people who earn that much. Menendez said limiting deductions would create a "double whammy" on New Jerseyans, where he said a $250,000 joint income does not necessarily equate to great wealth.

Menendez said two key factors may give this health care push more of a chance than previous attempts. First, he said President Obama is including Congress more in early discussions. Second, he said there is more of a unified demand for reform from a broad swath of interests, including the public, businesses, labor groups and doctors.

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Non-partisan analysts with the Office of Legislative Services predicted Monday that cigarette tax revenue will dip next fiscal year despite a proposed tax increase. If the projection is right, it would mark the second consecutive loss of revenue following a cigarette tax hike, but the lead OLS budget analyst said the falling income is not strictly a result of rising taxes. Instead, Legislative Budget and Finance Officer David Rosen said the losses would be even greater were it not for the tax increases.

“To look simply at the gross collections on the cigarette tax and attribute behavior to one change would be inappropriate,” Rosen said at a Senate budget committee hearing. He later added, "The proposed cigarette tax will, in fact, result in more money coming in than if we didn’t do it."

Cigarette tax revenue fell in New Jersey - and Pennsylvania - last time each state raised the tax, but Rosen said that in New Jersey, at least, other factors were at play. The state banned indoor smoking around the same time and there is a natural decrease in smoking every year regardless of tax policy, he said.

Critics, however, have said raising the tax is counter-productive. They contend that higher taxes drive smokers to buy cigarettes in lower-cost states or online, and New Jersey is left with less money.

OLS projects that a 12.5 cent-per-pack cigarette tax increase will leave the state with about $7 million less in revenue. The Corzine administration is projecting a $20 million revenue increase, but even the state treasurer sounded unsure of what exactly would happen because of the recent 62 cent-per-pack federal tax hike.

"Clearly we're going to be uncharted territory now with the federal tax going up as it is," Treasurer David Rousseau said. 

Sen. Shirley Turner (D., Mercer), said in Central Jersey she sees many residents going to Pennsylvania to by cigarettes and alcohol and worried about the impact on her district and in South Jersey.

Rosen said South Jersey, with its proximity to Pennsylvania and Delaware, would likely see a bigger impact.

“In a place like Mercer County, there is the ability, the fairly easy ability, for consumers to make purchases across the river if there is a significant price differential,” Rosen said. “In the past, when we have raised cigarette prices, the shops just across the river get more business, there’s no question about that. Other parts of the state, that’s more difficult and less economically attractive to people.”

Senate Majority Leader Stephen Sweeney (D., Gloucester), worried about convenience store owners in his South Jersey district losing business to Delaware, where the tax is far lower.

Rousseau said his staff would prepare an analysis that shows how past cigarette tax revenues have compared with the predicted benefits.

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If the Corzine administration’s budget forecast for the next fiscal year are bleak, projections by the non-partisan Office of Legislative Services are downright dismal.

Legislative Budget and Finance Officer David Rosen, testifying before the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee Monday morning, said the state is in the “most significant revenue downturn in its modern history.” In dollars and cents, OLS estimates revenues for the fiscal year that begins July 1, 2009 will be down 11 percent from the current fiscal year. To put that in perspective, the state has only dealt with declining revenues from one year to the next twice int he past four decades, in 1975 and in 2002, Rosen said.

The good and bad news is that New Jersey is not alone. At least 35 states project declining revenues in the current fiscal year and 43 states report budget gaps, Rosen said.

State treasurer David Rousseau is scheduled to give a revenue update Monday afternoon.

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Camden County College will present a new award Thursday night to Donald Norcross – a labor leader, co-chairman of the Camden County Democratic Committee, brother of unelected political leader George Norcross and a possible future candidate for state office.

Donald Norcross, president of the Southern New Jersey AFL-CIO Central Labor Council, is mentioned in political circles as a possible replacement for state Sen. Dana Redd, who is running for mayor in Camden City.

The first annual Civic Leadership Award, presented by the college’s Center for Civic Leadership and Responsibility, comes with no prize other than a framed copy of the board of trustees’ resolution bestowing the honor, according to college spokeswoman Susan Coulby.

A statement from the college reads: “Whether championing the causes of working families, ensuring that the needs of social service organizations and their clients are met, spearheading efforts toward urban renewal or helping steer the course of political history, Norcross has spent his life leading and serving his community.”

The award will be presented at the college’s Blackwood campus, in a student atrium that will be transformed into a gala event, which includes a cocktail hour and dinner. 

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Another former New Jersey Senator is on trial. This time it's a North Jersey case, but the circumstances will sound very familiar to anyone who followed the trial that led to the conviction of former Senator Wayne Bryant, who represented parts of Camden County.

And once again, Senate President Richard J. Codey (D., Essex), while not charged in any way, has been pulled into the mix through testimony.

The North Jersey trial involves Joseph Coniglio, who was a relatively low-ranking Senator who sat on the powerful Senate Budget Committee before being indicted. Prosecutors allege he got a no-show job at a Hackensack hospital in exchange for steering state grants to the facility.

According to the testimony reported by the Bergen Record, Codey helped Coniglio by calling a hospital executive and vouching for the former Senator. Codey declined to comment to the paper yesterday, citing the ongoing trial.

Bryant was a far bigger player in state politics, but he was convicted of almost the exact same thing: getting a no-show job at the University of Medicine and Dentistry and bringing tens of thousands of dollars of grant money to the school, among other charges.

In that case, Codey also had a hand in divvying up the controversial "MAC grants" that he, Bryant and another key Senator doled out to pet causes with little outside scrutiny. Bryant used some of his pot of taxpayer money to deliver aid to UMDNJ.

Codey has not been accused of anything criminal in either case. But as Senate president he appointed both Bryant and Coniglio to the influential budget committee, and in both instances he appears to have helped the Senators land other perks or power that later led to corruption charges.

During the Bryant trial he said he later helped reform the grant-making process to make it more transparent.

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Gov. Corzine said today he supports a recommendation to allow illegal immigrants living in New Jersey to pay in-state tuition at the state's public colleges. But he called a proposal to let illegal immigrants obtain drivers' licenses "problematic."

"There are some recommendations, no matter how well intentioned, that cannot be accomplished without a comprehensive policy at the federal level, and drivers’ licenses for the undocumented is one of them," Corzine said in a statement.

His comments came in response to a report by his Blue Ribbon Panel on Immigrant Policy that recommended both of those steps. The panel was chaired by Public Advocate Ronald Chen.

Several states have taken up the drivers' license issue, but only a handful have approved the step. A greater number of states have OK'd in-state tuition for illegal immigrants.

Both ideas come with controversy. A recent Monmouth University/Gannett New Jersey poll found that few people support letting illegal immigrants pay the lower in-state rates. Meanwhile a national group that favors tight immigration controls is ramping up opposition to in-state tuition for illegal immigrants in several states, including New Jersey.

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Much of the coverage of a judge's decision this week on Gov. Corzine's school funding plan rightly focused on the policy implications it could have on education throughout the state, but The Record's Alfred Doblin argues in a column that there was another meaningful impact: it provided a much-needed political victory for the governor.

The opinion largely backed Corzine's effort to tackle one of the most divisive, intractable and influential pieces of New Jersey government. In aiming to revamp the school funding formula, Corzine took on a long-festering problem that impacts schools and property tax bills throughout the state. And he did it in the face of opposition from urban leaders who normally make up his base. The result, if given a final Supreme Court OK, could help middle class suburban districts across New Jersey.

Members of both parties had long complained about a school funding system that sent billions of dollars to 31 historically poor, urban districts, often to the exclusion of the rest of the state. But it took Corzine to develop, and push through, a plan that essentially says that most of those urban areas have enough money already, and that the state should provide more help to other districts that also have needs to be met.

Doblin says Corzine is "trying to create something more equitable" and that "for once" New Jersey isn't just throwing money at a problem.

"What New Jerseyans should note is that "the unfixable" is improving and it's a liberal politician that is doing it," Doblin writes of Corzine's attempts to throw off the constraints of the Abbott v. Burke rulings that required sending more money to those 31 districts.

"Republicans will be hard-pressed to spin this court decision to their advantage. Liberal Corzine came up with an exit strategy out of Abbott," Doblin writes.

Indeed, Republicans praised the judge's ruling that essentially supported Corzine's plan. Advocates for urban schools, meanwhile, say they will be short-changed by the new plan.

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