For the first time in over 40 years, New Jersey had two consecutive governors who were re-elected to serve two terms in office.

Even though Chris Christie and Phil Murphy have very different political views and come from dissimilar professional backgrounds, the majority of NJ voters felt comfortable re-electing both men after their first four years.

Now residents of The Garden State have a gubernatorial election year on deck. Historically a Blue State in Presidential Elections, New Jersey's electorate has voted for Democratic Candidates each year since 1992.

But with President Donald Trump flipping 61 New Jersey towns in the 2024 presidential election, political analysts are curiously watching how this may impact New Jersey's 2025 Gubernatorial Election.

Research Reveals Most NJ Residents Are Undecided About Next Governor

Emerson College Polling's latest survey revealed some interesting results about New Jersey voters' views on the current group of candidates for NJ's gubernatorial race. With no incumbent running for the office, both Republicans and Democrats will be holding Primary Elections in less than six months.

However, their research found that approximately 52 percent of New Jersey voters who plan to vote in the Primary Election are Undecided. They found 47 percent of Republicans are Undecided about who they would vote for Governor while 56 percent of Democrats are Undecided.

While current Governor Phil Murphy has a 75 percent approval rating among New Jersey Democrats, there is no consensus among the party's electorate who they would vote for next governor.

Here is the Breakdown of the Democratic Candidates for NJ Governor

-Mikie Sherrill: 10 percent
-Sean Spiller: 8 percent
-Ras Baraka: 8 percent
-Josh Gottheimer: 7 percent
-Stephen Sweeney: 7 percent
-Steve Fulop: 4 percent

Those poll results show that those candidates have a lot of work to do convincing Undecided Democratic Voters why they should be the next Governor of New Jersey. Since 1975, five of New Jersey's eight elected governors have been Democrats.

Sherrill is a Congresswoman from North Jersey who graduated from the US Naval Academy and was a Naval Helicopter Pilot before entering politics.  Spiller has a very different background, serving as the Mayor of Montclair and President of he New Jersey Education Association.

Baraka is the current Major of Newark and running on a platform focused on the economy (which is currently the most important issue to New Jersey voters).  Gottheimer is another North Jersey Congressman whose voting record is a Political Moderate with experience working with bipartisan committees in Washington, DC.

On the flipside, New Jersey has only had one Republican elected governor in the 21st Century.  But there is more consensus among Republican voters about who they want as the next candidate to represent them in the gubernatorial race.

Jack Ciattarelli is currently favored by 26 percent of Republican voters to be the next governor of New Jersey.  Ciattarelli's popularity stems from his close race against Phil Murphy in the 2021 Gubernatorial Election. Murphy won by less than three percentage points with Ciattarelli gaining 48 percent of New Jersey votes.

The only other Republican candidate getting significant recognition among the Republican Governor candidate field is Bill Spadea. With 13 percent of Republicans polled wanting Spadea to be the next governor, he has more voter interest in his candidacy than hopefuls Jon Bramnick (4%), Roger Bacon (3%), Hans Herberg (3%), and Edward Durr (2%) combined.

Here is the full list of people who have served as the Governor of New Jersey over the last 250 years:

Every Governor New Jersey has ever had

Gallery Credit: Joe Votruba

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