Middle Ground PAC

The Challenge:The New Jersey State Assembly Democrats faced a crossroads. For decades, county party-endorsed primary candidates were placed in the same row or column of the ballot. Getting “the line” pretty much assured victory. Rival candidates running without “the line” found themselves pushed into obscure parts of the ballot.

But litigation in 2024 overturned usage of “the line.” In 2025, State Assembly Democratic incumbents faced primary campaigns without benefit of “the line.” To make matters worse for State Assembly Democratic incumbents, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Steve Fulop was running his own slate of state legislative candidates against the Democratic State Assembly incumbents.

Yet, incumbent State Assembly Democrats didn’t recognize the threat that they faced. Many assumed they had won elections for reasons other than “the line” and, as a result, were running similar, anemic campaigns that they had in the past as if “the line” had nothing to do with their Democratic primary victories.

New Jersey Legislative District 37 (LD 37) was the toughest district to hold. Of those likely to vote in the Democratic primary, nearly half of the likely Democratic primary voters identified as Jewish. Fulop’s state legislative slate in LD 37—Emil “Yitz” Stern and Tamar Warburg—were both Jewish and very active in the Jewish community. On the other hand, the Democratic incumbents—Ellen Park and Shama Haider–were not Jewish. Even more challenging, one of them, Shama Haider, was Muslim and even refused to sign onto a “Support of Israel” resolution in the State Assembly.

Our Solution: Democratic Speaker Craig Coughlin recognized he had to intervene, creating an independent expenditure entitled Middle Ground PAC. A key focus of Midde Ground PAC was LD 37.

It became clear that Emil “Yitz” Stern was the most formidable opponent. He had raised significantly more money than any of the Democratic challengers. His visibility was extremely high in the Jewish community.

We stopped Stern’s momentum through our video, “Weekend With Christie.” The video highlighted Stern’s support of former Republican Governor Chris Christie. Polling showed Christie was especially disliked.

Leveraging advanced geo-targeted addressable technology, we ensured programmatic streaming digital content reached likely voters at a 90% residential match rate–-higher than IP- or cookie-matching provides–maximizing the impact of our efforts. This “scalpel” approach was essential because our priority was to reach likely voters where they were.

At the same time, it was becoming clear that Democratic turnout would go well beyond likely voters. We also placed our ad on stand-alone streaming services, YouTube and Meta through a “sledgehammer” approach. These platforms don’t match lists well if at all, so are delivered throughout an entire district. This “sledgehammer” approach created buzz in the district, helping reinforce the “scalpel” approach.

The Result: The video was completed, despite no “red box” materials made available by the hard side, for $2000 with a digital placement budget of $15,000.

The Park and Haider slate successfully won, doubling “Yitz” Stern’s total. Additionally, a message was sent to any future Democratic House challengers looking to take on Democratic House incumbents.