Did New Jersey’s 1988 U.S. Senate Campaign Lay the Foundation for Today’s Political Climate?

Check election records from 1988, and the numbers will tell you that New Jersey voters re-elected Democrat Frank Lautenberg to the U.S. Senate by a comfortable margin of 8.4 percentage points.

 

But the numbers don’t tell the full story of Lautenberg’s victory over Republican challenger Pete Dawkins. The contest profoundly impacted the nature of future electoral campaigns by setting a disturbing tone for political discourse, which continues to play out across America today.