In an editorial, Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla gives his take on President-elect Donald Trump (R) defeating Vice President Kamala Harris, particularly what it means for New Jersey.
The Presidential election, I truly hope, was an eye opener for all Democrats serving and seeking to serve as public officials.
MAGA Republicans gained significant support across the country, including right here in Hudson County. We are now witnessing the consequences of a second Trump presidency in real time as unqualified ideologues are selected to run our most important federal agencies.
Last week should have been a wake-up call for many. What lessons will we learn from it? I see four things we can do right now to prepare for 2025 in New Jersey and beyond.
First, We Need to Focus on Everyday Kitchen Table Issues
I am proud that my first act as Hoboken’s Mayor was to sign an Executive Order declaring Hoboken a “Fair and Welcoming Community.” During a divisive time, that Order was meant to make clear that all people have equal rights under the law.
However, as I enter my 8th year in office, it’s clear that the call of the day is ensuring state and local government prioritize everyday kitchen table concerns.
My declaration didn’t lower the rent for residents. It didn’t pay medical bills, make childcare affordable, or lower the cost of living.
If we are to learn anything from this past election, it is that to be a truly Fair and Welcoming Community we must be an affordable community as well.
And when I say this past election, we need look no further than the results of Hoboken’s rent control referendum.
Hoboken voters overwhelmingly rejected an existential threat to affordable housing here by a 3-1 margin, far larger than the 2-1 margin that Vice President Harris prevailed over President Trump in Hoboken.
The lesson here is kitchen table issues are non-partisan. Any candidate who listens to voters can lead from the front on these issues.
The Fight for Reproductive Rights Will Be Fought Everywhere, Including Here in New Jersey
Since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, reproductive rights have been on the ballot in red state and blue states.
Tellingly, with few exceptions, even voters in red states like Kansas, Montana, Missouri, Arizona, Ohio, Nevada, and Kentucky have voted to allow women and doctors —not the government —to make their own healthcare choices.
Nonetheless, we once again have a federal government that is hostile to women’s reproductive choices.
In this environment, it is more important than ever that leaders at the state, county, and municipal level – do everything in our power to ensure women are protected by the law, and that we identify and implement means for women from other states to exercise the rights they are being denied.
The Voters are Telling us that Public Safety is Crucial
This past year has also been a reminder to me that public safety and safe communities concern people more than the distant worry of a fascist in the White House.
Whether it’s a murder of one of our beloved residents this summer or the recent violence in Church Square Park, residents in Hoboken have made it clear that safe communities are critical to a thriving community, and I fully agree.
I am proud of my record of supporting law enforcement. I pledge to continue to give law enforcement the tools they need to keep our community safe (please click here for a recent update I provided to the public), but there is more that must be done.
Whether it’s increased investment in social services for our unsheltered populations, getting qualified women and men to serve in uniform, or new approaches to enforcement, these are the investments that will more than pay for themselves in the long run.
Voters are Tired of the Political Machine and Barriers to Fair Voting
Our democracy is not viable if the people have barriers to voting and if there are barriers that keep qualified and good citizens from serving in office.
During recent elections, I noticed that there were a disproportionate number of early voting stations from municipality to municipality.
Here in Hoboken, we had access to only one early voting station, while Union City, a community of similar population, there were about 9 early voting stations.
Even more egregious, Jersey City, a city with four times the population of Union City has fewer early voting stations than Union City, with only 7 early voting stations.
When it comes to obtaining a party endorsement, most counties in New Jersey have varying degrees of conventions to nominate a party endorsed candidate.
In Hudson County, however, the “process” is akin to a smoke-filled backroom meeting. As a result, voters have lost faith in the Hudson County Democratic Organization in places like Hoboken and Jersey City.
While abolishing the line was a historic step towards a more democratic process, these small tactical advantages to the local party machine amounts to a death by a thousand cuts to fair elections.
We have so much more work ahead of us. If anything, the upshot from this election is that it is an opportunity for all of us to pause for a moment to listen, learn and develop policies and practices that are grounded in the everyday priorities of the residents we serve.
One can always rely on Ravi to spew the most vicious lies and hate to divide the community for political gain. He’s been at this for quite some time. Terror Flier anyone?
A nice little RICO would certainly expose the shakedowns, illicit arm twisting, department abuses and those Act Bluish questionable contributions.
Bring it!
Trying to blame the scary Republicans for the homeless, migrant e bikers, and violence is truly a hot take.
Faking a hate crime doesn’t seem to work anymore.
Hey, it got him this far!
stop tour national grandstanding
If Ravi needed a national election to alert him to these issues, he is simply not qualified to hold public office – at any level.
“Kitchen table issues” include higher taxes and what has his administration done to hold spending in check? E Bikes? Parking? Infrastructure/flooding? Outsourcing Rec programs?
Public safety is indeed a big issue – and one needs to look no further than the video of last night’s Community Safety meeting to understand how the people of Hoboken feel about how Team Bhalla has addressed it.Bhallas big aha moment was to acknowledge that Church Square Park is not what it once was. Really?
His point on fair voting is laughable; he used “the line” when it suited him and is now distancing himself from it. Turnout two weeks ago was pretty high and the VBM option has clearly gained traction. Yes, the County probably played favorites in terms of machines on election day – nothing new in Hudson County.
Reproductive rights are indeed a significant issue and New Jersey should have voice. That said, the Mayor of a city of 60k people should remain focused on the things a Mayor is supposed to control; thank you for your opinion, Ravi, and most of Hoboken probably agrees with you – now do your job.
That’s quite enough, Ravi.
You’re just digging yourself in a deeper and deeper socialist hole. I’m so glad that people came out last night and are finally waking up to your tired rhetoric accusing anyone who dares to speak up against you of “racism” and/or “sexism” or being a “MAGA Republican.”
Look in the mirror.
YOU are the reason Hoboken residents are less safe. YOU have raised taxes on Hoboken residents in each year or your reign of terror (or terrible reign). YOU are the reason our quality of life has eroded. YOU and the reason there is so much division in town.
Seemingly not a week passes without you claiming to be a “victim” of some sort, yet the real victims are your own constituents and, God forbid, those who may actually be victims of real racism or real sexism. You claim to know nothing about the 2017 racist fliers that helped get you elected, yet Edison had a similar incident the same week and caught suspects whom you admitted you knew “socially.” And your best friend, the then Attorney General and Bob Menendez confidant, Gurbir Grewal, chose not prosecute for “some” “reason.” You claim to have received multiple death threats, but yet not a single perpetrator has been convicted or even charged? Do you get off wasting taxpayer resources? Shame on you!! Because you stand for nothing and in EIGHT YEARS have literally accomplished nothing for Hoboken (sue Big Oil, really?), you have to find something or some group of people to stand against: “MAGA Republicans.”
You cry wolf, ride social justice waves like BLM and loony gender fluidity, and latch on to national initiatives like Vision Zero just to keep your pathetic name in NYC news. You employ such shady schemes and deploy rotten council puppets to weasel your way to more power in Trenton or Washington, seeing Hoboken only as a stepping stone and its residents gullible casualties.
Well, you need to wake TF up! Just as you dared poke the Hudson County Democrat machine – knowing full well how the game is rigged/played – and now know Stack has buried you, so too will you soon realize that your political off ramps from your complete failure as Hoboken mayor close without detour.
You’re done. You are done.
It was so wonderful to see everyone turn out last night and realize how you have not only no plan but also no clue. You showed ZERO empathy even forgetting the guy who employed the nanny with who you apparently spent “a good hour.” His name is Bill, Ravi. Bill. And Bill both called you out last night and also just posted online which I’ll glad share,
“As I said when I had a chance to speak, Bhalla gave my wife and I more than 60 minutes to discuss these challenges and how to drive change. It was a productive dialogue. Though none of what I urged was presented this evening.
Explicitly I urged him, his admin and the public safety director to come with clear and actionable next steps they would be doing locally to mitigate these issues. Be prescriptive with the community about what he’s doing right now, what he’ll do next and what will come later. Outline the challenges at a state level and a federal level and help us all understand how we can drive change at those levels. But absolutely do not punt to budget problems.
Instead of being prescriptive, he waited until the day of this meeting to publish a multi paragraph diatribe that amounts to urging Instead of being prescriptive, he waited until the day of this meeting to publish a multi paragraph diatribe that amounts to urging the council to support added police staffing and two added social workers.
That’s not a plan. That’s not even a concept of a plan. Those are tactics.”
You supported defunding the police before you were suddenly for them when you need your failed municipal complex to house the DPW you gave to Ironside in exchange for Monarch so you could appease 6th Ward voters. And now taxpayers are on the $80M hook and we can’t recruit any officers. Remember Antifa’s ACAB (All Cops Are Bastards), right? And both you and your formerly Soros-employed brother not only pushed for, but loudly promoted, bail reform accusing the system of being racist.
So happily, for the country, stare, and city of Hoboken’s sake – yes, even liberal Hoboken – Americans are waking up to the fact that YOU and your extreme leftist beliefs are the problem. It is YOU who tear apart the nuclear family, YOU who indoctrinate our children in public schools and libraries with sexuality, YOU who install Soros prosecutors who fail to charge actual crime, especially if committed by “undocumented migrants” (aka illegal immigrants), yet routinely weaponize lawfare to attack conservatives, and YOU whom resort to – in a pathetically desperate attempt to hold onto your COVID-power but yet you know deep down is quickly slipping through your greedy fingers – continually attacking the clear majority now, us so-called “MAGA Republicans” many of whom are actually Democrats, as you have so pathetically predictably done here.
But, alas dear Ravinder! Your evil schemes are not working. Your walls of realty are quickly closing in, and the more you attempt to sew division amongst your constituents by labeling those who disagree with you as “racist,” “sexist,” “MAGA Republicans” the quicker the close in on you.
You are done. It’s over.
So a bit of advice: stop being such an absolute evil wank. Listen to your constituents, many of whom called you out last night including one highly astute, obviously superior, young woman who finally admitted, “I do want to ask for a little bit of introspection for the city of Hoboken. Because I think we support ideas, beliefs, policies, people that have led to this exact result. And if we don’t admit that to ourselves and change the way we, you know, vote or support people or ideas – like it’s a little bit disingenuous for us – it’s very easy to yell at everyone, but it’s on us too.”
Every swamp rat crying about Trump and the Republicans are now trying to ditch their ideological idiocy, only because they got their asses kicked on November 5th. Many of us have thought for the past four years that we’ve been living in a strange world where the most mentally disabled are indulged and their every whim coddled to the extreme detriment of the rest of us.
Americans want to get back to normal. They don’t want to live in the ideologies of the far left. The truth is that most people in this country are tolerant of differing opinions, but everyone has a limit. The past four years were nothing short of insanity.
What the hell did I just read?
Ravi must have run out of money from his failed campaign for Congress and/or not have paid his PR man, Rob Horowitz, to write this for him as it’s all over the place.
Yet still true to his self aggrandizement form, our failed mayor:
1. Published this the same day hundreds of angry Hoboken resident pack City Hall demanding answers to the rampant crime in Hoboken, including – BUT NOT LIMITED TO – the recent attack in Church Square Park on both a black woman and elderly man, which hospitalized the former with a fractured skull. No one felt the meeting was on the least productive as Ravi had no plan to address the seriousness of the eroding safety in town, despite meeting for over and hour with the employer of the nanny who was attacked during which time the employer pleaded with him to develop and share during the meeting. Oh, and Ravi forgot his name during the meeting. It’s Bill, Ravi. I know he’s white and it’s a typically “colonizer” (aka English) name, but it’s Bill. Try to seem like you care.
2. Fear mongers by blaming “MAGA Republicans” who threaten, for example, women’s rights to an abortion (despite not being able to either define a “woman,” leaving out men altogether who – remember – can also get pregnant, and not appreciating there is no such “right” constitutionality guaranteed). He also blames early voting instead of recognizing that, hey, maybe – just maybe – Democrats like me actually voted for the orange man due to our own party’s massive failures with the economy, border, and leftist propaganda like gender fluidity and sexualization of children in public schools and libraries.
3. Blatantly lies about his support for law enforcement; see some of his Soros’ stain brother’s and his personal tweets supporting defunding the police, bail reform, and Obama “deescalation” mandates which undoubtedly fueled the anti-police ANTIFA rhetoric – and yet he wonders why we can’t recruit police?? Ravi only started supporting the police when he pushed his massive “municipal complex” – another failed promise of his term that he said to this very site was “110% going to happen” yet didn’t – because he has no place for the DPW, the Observer lot on which housed the DPW for decades previous and he gave to a developer (Ironside) in yet another of his shady backroom deals.
4. Pokes the Hudson County Democrat Organization again by suggesting he can fix it when, for years, he took full advantage of the corrupt machine and now finds himself blackballed by it with no political exit for running against Rob. (Rumor has it that now even Fulop doesn’t want Ravi weighing down his gubernatorial ticket despite the Ravi’s kickback he gave Fulop’s wife, the marijuana dispensary uptown, which really upset many locals.
The very fact he’s now resorting to writing his own op eds is telling. Can he no longer get one of his puppets or wife (Emily) to do it for him??