TOMS RIVER, NJ — With the Republican gubernatorial primary approaching on June 10, 2025, and a heated three-way battle looming, it was only a matter of time before New Jersey politics took its usual turn—filled with mudslinging and baseless attacks. This week featured much of that invective, particularly against conservative radio host and current gubernatorial candidate Bill Spadea. Spadea has recently faced a series of attacks, accusing him of everything from betraying his conservative base to hiring covert Democrats to run his campaign—even outright fraud.
It may seem irrelevant to address accusations this early, especially given they will almost certainly be replaced by newer, uglier smears. But the truth is, setting the record straight in the early stages of an important campaign does a great deal of good—by discrediting false narratives before they can damage good candidates, but, most importantly by exposing the political hacks who thrive on spreading lies and distortions. That is exactly what the information below is all about: exposing the attacks against Bill Spadea as baseless and setting the record straight.
If you want to know the truth about the New Jersey governor’s race, keep reading.
The first accusation against Bill that I encountered during my review of the online back-and-forth was straightforward: Bill Spadea has hired a Democrat political operative to run his PAC and campaign for governor. This, critics claim, reveals that his efforts to become governor demonstrate either a betrayal of his conservative base or a secret plan to derail the Republicans’ chances of taking back Trenton through trickery and deceit! Creative? Sure. Utterly false? Absolutely!
And a deep dive into the facts demonstrates this beyond much doubt. Who is this alleged Democrat? The answer is George Gilmore, a veteran political consultant and current Ocean County GOP chairman who has worked for a variety of Republican candidates throughout the years. He even played a key role in the election of Chris Christie in 2009. (Love him or hate him, Christie is no Democrat.) Politico described Gilmore as “the undisputed boss of the most powerful Republican organization in New Jersey.”
So, how do Spadea’s critics justify calling him a Democrat? One online article I came across described Gilmore as “a senior advisor at a Democratic lobbying firm.” That seemed questionable, so I did some research. The claim refers not only to Gilmore’s role with Optimus Partners but also to his time on the board of the 1868 Public Affairs Group.
It’s true that Optimus is owned by Democrat Phil Norcross, but is that enough to make it a Democratic firm? The firm itself claims to be nonpartisan, working with clients on both sides of the aisle, and its public disclosures show this truth pretty clearly. Last year, Optimus derived most of its income through consulting with big-name corporations like Uber and Amazon—not political candidates—and certainly not from Democratic clients in particular. The claim that Gilmore is a progressive simply because of his involvement with the 1868 Public Affairs Group is even weaker. According to its website, the firm describes itself as “a prominent bipartisan full-service firm specializing in government and public affairs, legislative and regulatory affairs monitoring, stakeholder mobilization planning, and communication strategy.” Hardly the stuff of a radical agenda. If this qualifies as a left-wing operation, then the local Chamber of Commerce might as well be a chapter of the Socialist Party.
In reality, 1868 is nothing of the sort. A review of their major clientele features your standard corporate lineup: Walmart, Verizon, PSE&G, FanDuel, and DraftKings, among others. Like Optimus, 1868 is a business, not an ideological enterprise. While a couple of board members of both firms may participate in progressive politics in their spare time, this does not make either organization “Democratic,” and it certainly does not make Gilmore a progressive for lending them his expertise.
Spadea’s only ‘crime’—if you can even call it that—is being politically astute. He understands that a multimillion-dollar gubernatorial race requires the most seasoned political operatives. And those operatives—the ones at the highest level of the consulting industry—are inevitably going to rub shoulders with and even work alongside members of the other party. This is not news to anyone familiar with New Jersey politics or with politics in general. The fact that George Gilmore has worked with Democrats in a series of nonpartisan public affairs firms throughout the years is not news—nor is it anything close to an indictment of the Spadea campaign.
Losers don’t legislate, and Spadea has no intention of losing this election. Neither do New Jersey’s Republican voters, who have endured enough losses under the weak leadership of corporate sellout Jack Ciattarelli and the RINOs running the NJ-GOP. The truth is that to win in 2025, NJ conservatives are going to have to pull out all the stops. Despite their lack of any real message and a pathetic showing in the last presidential election, the Democratic party remains a powerful enemy with no shortage of historic advantages in the state. Instead of past candidates who abandoned common-sense social positions and denounced Trump at every opportunity (the ‘We are better than this!’ crowd), conservatives need to get smart and start beating Democrats at their own game.
Spadea understands this, and the fact that he is doing whatever it takes to run a formidable campaign and knock the failed Republican establishment out of power should be a cause for celebration – not criticism.
