Democratic candidate Mikie Sherrill will win the New Jersey governor’s race, defeating Republican challenger Jack Ciattarelli, NBC News projected Tuesday night.
Sherrill will succeed Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat finishing his second and final term.
The race — one of just two U.S. gubernatorial elections this year — was seen as a bellwether for how President Donald Trump‘s policies are affecting support for Republicans nationally.
Trump had endorsed Ciattarelli and vocally supported him during the campaign.
Sherrill’s projected win could help shape the electoral landscape for the 2026 midterms, when Democrats hope to retake control of at least one chamber of Congress.
Sherrill, a former U.S. Navy helicopter pilot, has represented New Jersey’s 11th congressional district in the House of Representatives since 2019.
Ciattarelli is a businessman who has run for governor twice before.
While Democrats far outnumber Republicans in New Jersey, some polls leading up to Tuesday’s election showed a neck-and-neck race between the candidates.
But early voting totals before Election Day showed Democrats building a solid turnout firewall, according to DecisionDeskHQ Data Science Director Michael Pruser.
State officials said Tuesday morning that multiple polling places received non-credible bomb threats, causing some voters to be redirected to other sites to cast their ballots.
Sherrill called the threats “a clear attempt to undermine our democratic system and intimidate New Jerseyans from going to the polls to exercise their right to vote.”
Trump lost New Jersey to Democratic nominee Kamala Harris in the 2024 election. But he drew a larger share of the vote than he had received in the 2016 election, partly by making inroads with the state’s Latino communities.
Sherrill courted those voters who have traditionally favored Democrats, in part by speaking Spanish on the campaign trail and in TV ads.
She has also run a campaign centered on affordability, hewing to Democrats’ broader messaging strategy.
Ciattarelli, whom Trump endorsed, ran a campaign that echoed much of the president’s MAGA agenda.
The election came in the middle of a protracted federal government shutdown, for which Americans blame Republicans and Trump more than Democrats, polls show.
Both candidates raised over $20 million and spent nearly $17 million heading into the final stretch of the race.
Despite suffering demoralizing losses in 2024 and grappling with persistently low approval ratings, Democrats have reasons to be optimistic about the 2026 cycle.
Trump’s approval ratings have fallen precipitously since the start of his term and are lower than where they stood at this point in his first term, according to multiple polls.
Anti-Trump sentiment has been a galvanizing force for Democrats in the past and present, notably at the recent “No Kings” protests that drew millions of participants across the country.
