Governor Phil Murphy’s nominee for New Jersey Supreme Court Associate Justice John Jay Hoffman has reached a key point in his quest for Senate confirmation with the endorsement of State Senator Latham Tiver (R-Southampton), the New Jersey Globe confirmed.
The Senate is expected to consider Hoffman’s nomination in early September.
The New Jersey Globe estimates that Hoffman has the support of a majority of members of the Senate Judiciary Committee and at least 21 votes in the full Senate, which could put him on the Supreme Court as soon as the 2024-25 legislative session begins.
Murphy nominated Hoffman on June 10. Hoffman previously served as acting New Jersey attorney general and as Rutgers University’s general counsel for the past eight years. If confirmed, he will replace Judge Lee A. Solomon, who reaches the mandatory retirement age of 70 on Saturday after serving 10 years on the state’s highest court.
Tiver, a young Republican from Burlington County, had to agree with Hoffman under the unwritten rule of senatorial courtesy that prevents consideration of a governor’s nominee until the senators of his home district have given their approval.
Senate President Nicholas Scutari played a key role in working with Tiver and the governor’s office to pave the way for Hoffman’s now likely confirmation by the Supreme Court.
At the same time, the Senate is also expected to consider Murphy’s nomination of a close Tiver ally, Southampton Republican Mayor Michael S. Mikulski III, for a Supreme Court judge.
Murphy is also expected to nominate former state Sen. Jean Stanfield (R-Westhampton) for a seat on the New Jersey Parole Board and businessman Robert Healey for a seat on the South Jersey Transportation Authority; Healey was the Republican nominee for Congress in 2022 against Democrat Andy Kim (D-Moorestown). In addition, former Bass River Mayor Deborah Buzby-Cope is likely to be appointed to the Pinelands Commission.
Hoffman, 59, was serving as deputy attorney general in June 2013 when Governor Chris Christie appointed Attorney General Jeff Chiesa to the U.S. Senate following the death of Frank R. Lautenberg.
In return, Christie appointed Hoffman as acting attorney general, which was supposed to be a temporary assignment. Later that year, Christie announced his intention to appoint his chief of staff, Kevin O’Dowd, as attorney general. But the Bridgegate scandal put O’Dowd on ice – Christie never officially nominated him – and he left state government a year later.
As a result, Hoffman remained acting attorney general for nearly three years until he left in March 2016 to become vice president and general counsel at Rutgers.
Chiesa and other Republicans, including State Senator Jon Bramnick (R-Westfield), had championed Hoffman’s nomination.
Hoffman served as an assistant U.S. attorney in New Jersey, prosecuting white-collar and financial crimes, and as chief of investigations for the New Jersey State Comptroller’s Office for about two years before Chiesa appointed him to his leadership team in 2012.
Hoffman is an unaffiliated voter and will fill a Republican seat, following a precedent set by Republican Gov. Christine Todd Whitman in 1999 when she nominated Jaynee LaVecchia, who had never joined a political party, to succeed retiring Republican Judge Marie Garibaldi. LaVecchia had been deputy chief counsel to Gov. Tom Kean and served in Whitman’s cabinet, and was considered Republican enough to qualify for the seat.
Mikulski, 55, recently retired as a decorated colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve. During his 30 years of service, he served in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. After serving on the school board, Mikulski was elected to the town committee in 2014. He has been a practicing attorney for 31 years.
Murphy’s nomination of former state Division of Criminal Justice Director Pearl Minato to be a Superior Court judge last year was approved by Tiver but is not on the Senate’s September calendar. Minato is a former chief of staff of the controversial Office of Public Integrity and Accountability, and her nomination has stalled over concerns about OPIA conduct.
Hoffman will likely face questions from the Senate Judiciary Committee about OPIA’s allegations that he was partly responsible for “an era of inaction” in which prosecuting public corruption was not a priority.
