Robert Littell

If Republicans lose any seats in the State Assembly in the November mid-term election, look for Peter Biondi to challenge Alex DeCroce for Minority Leader. The 65-year-old Biondi, a five-term Assemblyman from Somerset County, ousted Guy Gregg from the #2 leadership post, Republican Conference Chairman, after the 2005 election.

Formr Republican State Chairman Virginia Littell, the wife of State Senator Robert Littell and the mother of Assemblywoman Alison McHose, wants the state GOP to "ban employees of the NJGOP from seeking outside campaign consulting contracts with candidates or committees active in Republican primaries."

During this cycle, the Republican State Committee Communications and Research Director, Todd Riffle, was also a consultant to Guy Gregg's campaign for State Senate. At the time Riffle was first paid, Gregg's opponent was Littell, a 36-year incumbent.

While not exactly Hudson County, the race for the Republican State Senate nomination in the 24th district in Sussex and Morris counties was indeed brutal.  The contest for veteran Bob Littell's seat attracted two candidates: seven-term Assemblyman Guy Gregg, and Steven Oroho, a Sussex County Freeholder and Littell's handpicked successor.  Gregg was viewed as the front-runner, but he had expected to run against Littell's forty-year legislative record and not watch the race become a referendum on his own votes in Trenton.

The National Federation of Independent Business, New Jersey’s leading small-business advocacy group, will endorse Guy Gregg for the GOP State Senate nomination at a new conference tomorrow.  Gregg, a seven-term Assemblyman, faces Sussex County Freeholder Steve Oroho for the 24th district seat of retiring State Sen. Bob Littell.

State Sen. Robert Littell, the dean of the New Jersey Legislature, will not seek re-election to another term in the Senate.  The 71-year-old Sussex County Republican was elected to the State Assembly in 1967, and moved up to the State Senate when Wayne Dumont left in 1990.

Littell's retirement sets up a 24th district Senate primary between Assemblyman Guy Gregg and Littell's hand-picked successor, Sussex County Freeholder Steve Oroho.  Assemblywoman Alison Littell McHose, the Senator's daughter, will seek re-election on Oroho's slate.