The state is facing a gap between projected revenue and expected spending. Some lawmakers want ICE agents to remove their masks. Schools need money. Where do New Jersey Republican lawmakers stand? State Sen. Jon Bramnick (R-Union) answers some questions on budget issues, federal immigration enforcement and more. This NJ Spotlight News interview has been lightly edited.
Joanna Gagis: Gov. Mikie Sherrill and her newly confirmed treasurer, Aaron Binder, came forward [Thursday] to say that we’re facing this $3 billion deficit, and the $7 billion surplus could be gone after two years. What do you say to that?
Jon Bramnick: We’ve been talking about that for a long time. There’s been all kinds of communication from the prior administration: Everything’s rosy. Look, if you remember when Gov. Chris Christie came in and even when acting Gov. Dick Codey was here, he said, “We’re not bankrupt, but we’re close.” She’s just facing reality. And I’m proud of the fact that she’s talking about reality.
JG: She says that she’s reached out to every legislator. Has she reached out to you? And if so, have you shared any recommendations on what needs to happen here to fix this and close this gap?
JB: Well, not in the last couple of days, but I’ve been in touch with the governor on a number of issues. My recommendation is stop spending. It was getting out of control. Everybody knew it. And nobody wanted to talk about it until the election was over. So my recommendation is: Hey, it’s going to hurt and it’s going to be painful, but you’ve got to do it.
JG: We’ve seen a lot of Republican senators speaking out recently, calling on a different funding model for schools. School districts that are struggling, facing multibillion-dollar shortfalls. I’m curious, when you say stop spending, where would the cuts come from? We know the state has a ballooned pension payment. We know school funding is more critical than ever. Where do those cuts come from?
JB: I’m not looking at the entire budget, but they came up with Stay New Jersey. I love the concept — hundreds of millions of dollars. But it’s really a gimmick. I mean, why would we be against giving money back to taxpayers and homeowners? But that’s a big spend. You really can’t do that because you’re spending money you don’t have.
So there is a big spend that we all supported because we didn’t want to be against giving back money to homeowners. But it was way too much money. And we know how they dished out hundreds of million dollars. We call it like Christmas items, Christmas gifts at the end of the fiscal year. And that’s been exposed. Stop giving away all that money to all your partisan friends. This stuff’s not that complicated. This has been built up over many, many years.
JG: What do you make of Sherrill’s first month-and-a-half as governor? Do you have any assessment so far as to how she’s handling things or maybe trying to change things in Trenton?
JB: Well, what I do see is we unanimously supported her nominees, including the attorney general and her other nominees. I’m on Judiciary. So, so far, she’s putting up competent people. We voted unanimously for her nominees, which indicates she’s moving in the right direction generally. But you know, the tough part’s ahead.
JG: Yeah, for sure. Tough part’s definitely ahead. You are not afraid to buck your own party. You have spoken out and the only Republican lawmaker to vote for a bill that would require masks to come off law enforcement. Why?
JB: What is this, a party thing? How about if they pulled you over at two in the morning? Three people got out of a van with masks on. What’s this mask thing? You understand that I voted to take masks off protesters and some people didn’t like that, right?
We’ve all, all of the legislators around, we’ve had threats. You know, anybody can say they’ve gotten threats. I get that. But that’s the risk of being either in law enforcement or in the public arena. But we can’t start putting masks on everybody.
“This is something that’s un-American. Take the mask off. I want to see your face if you hit me over the head with a club.”
What I don’t understand is we, the Republicans, were the ones that never trusted government. Right. Now, all of a sudden: Oh, we can trust government. We can put masks on government. Really? When did that change? So I don’t want to hear this Republican-Democrat thing. This is something that’s un-American. Take the mask off. I want to see your face if you hit me over the head with a club. And I think people behind masks generally feel differently than if your face is exposed. What is this, Halloween?
JG: Are you concerned about — and we haven’t seen too much of it here in New Jersey, I should say, not publicly — but are you concerned about the number of citizens who have been detained by ICE?
JB: Look, I don’t have the numbers on that. What concerns me is that there is no path to citizenship. We’ve got people who’ve lived in this country for 25 years and whose kids grew up here. They don’t know any other country. Why doesn’t the federal government create a path to citizenship for people who’ve been here 20 years, 25 years, 15 years?
They believed and they’ve been under the impression that the government let them stay. Now, all of a sudden, 30 years from now, you crack the whip. I just think that’s unfair. I don’t know how many citizens are being arrested or detained. I do know that what’s happening now is not getting the worst of the worst out of our country.
JG: You are in the minority party. You can’t set the political agenda. But if you could, what would be one key priority you’d like to see this year?
JB: I’d stop giving money away to my friends. I would start being very fiscally conservative and I think what you heard [Thursday] was the beginning of a governor who’s saying ‘Oh, we’re in big trouble.’ You have to admit it you can’t paint a rosy picture. You have to tell everybody: Listen, there’s going to be some pain here.
Otherwise we’re going to continue to be the highest property tax state in the country. It’s just time to change how we drive government.
This story is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.
