When Campaign Mail Goes Bad...
(Williamstown, NJ) The Republican campaign of Sam Miles in Monroe Township sent out a direct mail piece attacking his opponent for a “closed” business in the Gloucester County Township. Turns out, the reason the business closed is because the owner was arrested for tax evasion.
You can read the story here. http://www.nj.com/cumberland/index.ssf/2012/08/south_jersey_car_dealer_nick_b.html
We talked to someone close to the Teefy campaign who said "while I am not authorized to speak for Dan Teefy, I am pretty sure he is against businesses that evade paying taxes."
This just continued to pile on the Republican hopeful who should really try to run his campaign away from the issues of crime, punishment and law and order.
Miles is also coming under fire again for another self-inflicted mistake; continuing a trend of bizarre and self-destructive behavior.
Last week the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission released a report showing that the Monroe Republican Campaign Committee has not in fact been purchasing all of their advertisements, literature and those cheesy campaign giveaways they give away for free.
Instead, all of these purchases have been directly made by A-Jacks Towing – a local business who recently filed a lawsuit against the Township to have some of its competitors kicked out of the towing rotation.
They are already calling it A-Jacks-gate. http://bettermonroe.blogspot.com/2014/10/a-jacks-gate-heating-up.html
What do A-Jack’s competitors have to say about the lawsuit? In a Philadelphia Inquirer article one was quoted as “He wants all the towing basically for himself… It's a shame. We're all just small businessmen."
According to a statement posted on the Teefy campaign's Facebook page, they are pointing out that this contradicts the Miles brand of honesty and integrity. They are quick to point out that the new Mayor will be in a position to settle the lawsuit and Miles' falsely claiming that his campaign has paid for the materials is troubling.
Locals tell me the Miles integrity argument came into light last week when he remained silent as one of his supporters criticized the Casalnova family in a published letter to the editor. All the Casalnova family did was express their shock that the father of the man who killed their daughter came knocking on their door asking for a vote. According to the family’s social media posts – this was the first interaction between Sam Miles and the father of Stacey Casalnova, the young woman whose life was cut short.
This led over 700 people to rally to the family’s side on a Facebook page meant which according to the site, was created to protect the family from the further politicization of their grief. To our knowledge, Sam Miles has still not addressed the situation, or even answer how he could not recognize the man whose family suffers because of his son.
To his credit, according to the letter posted by Stephen Casalnova – he does not think Sam Miles should be held accountable for the actions of his son, but he does feel Miles actions and behaviors after the tragic event show a glimpse of the real Sam Miles and not the “manufactured campaign image”.
Speaking of this issue, we remain perplexed that Democratic candidate Dan Teefy has remained silent. While we certainly understand that he does not want to bring family into a political campaign – hasn’t Sam Miles opened the door by saying he is going to push for tougher prosecution of criminals and drug dealers in Monroe? Shouldn’t Sam Miles have to answer these questions first?
What was your involvement with your son on January 1st, 2011? Did you have any role in him not turning himself into police until the late afternoon, nearly 12 hours after the accident happened? http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/01/02/driver-surrenders-in-deadly-nj-hit-and-run/
Did you advocate for lessened or softened sentence for your son? As Mayor, you will oversee and appoint the Township Prosecutor – how can you advocate for tougher punishment for criminals than those you sought for your family? http://www.mycentraljersey.com/article/BZ/20111028/NEWS01/310280025/
If a similar accident were to happen in Monroe Township where someone hit two pedestrians and left the scene of the accident, and one of the victims died – what prison sentence would you demand.
Do you find yourself credible to say that you are going to be tough on drug dealers and clean up the drug mess in Town?
I do not know why the Teefy campaign doesn’t think these questions are fair to ask. I think voters have the right to know where their Mayor stands on such tough issues. A source with knowledge of the campaign told me that Teefy is ignoring the issue completely out of respect to the Casalnova family, because he feels as though they are enduring too much pain just by having to see Miles’ name littered through the Township.
The source did say however that putting Sam Miles in charge of the Prosecutor’s office would be like putting Pete Rose in charge of the Gambling Commission.
As if Miles did not need any more bad press, NJ.Com reported this week that the Red Light camera program in New Jersey is set to expire legislatively. Therefore, it appears the new signs that say to end the red light program voters need to vote Republican – appear to be another campaign stunt gone wrong.
At least miles has a few days to get it together – voters should wait to see if he can save his campaign before he can save Monroe.
