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| Turnout | 52%[1] ( 12pp) | ||||||||||||||||
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 County results Congressional district results[a]Kean: 50–60% 60–70% 70–80% | |||||||||||||||||
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The1985 New Jersey gubernatorial election was held on November 5, 1985.IncumbentRepublicanGovernorThomas Kean won a landslide re-election against theDemocratic candidate,Essex County ExecutivePeter Shapiro. To date, Kean's is the largest margin in terms of percentage and raw votes in allNew Jersey gubernatorial elections.[2] Kean was the first Republican to be re-elected governor since 1949, and the first Republican to ever win two four-year terms.
Primary elections were held on June 4. Kean was unopposed for the Republican nomination. In the Democratic primary, Shapiro prevailed over strong competition from Senate PresidentJohn F. Russo and Newark mayorKenneth A. Gibson.Stephen B. Wiley andRobert Del Tufo ran competitive campaigns but finished well behind the top three.
The general election was a foregone conclusion in favor of the popular incumbent. Kean won 564 out of 567municipalities (all exceptAudubon Park,Chesilhurst, andRoosevelt)[3] and a 62% majority amongAfrican-American voters,[4] a remarkable margin for a modern Republican candidate. Kean'scoattails led the Republicans to win theGeneral Assembly for the first time since the 1971 elections.[5] To date, Kean is the last Republican to winEssex andHudson counties in a statewide election and the last candidate of any party to carry every county. Until2021, this was the last election where the winning candidate was of the same party as the sitting president.
| Primary campaign finance activity | |
|---|---|
| Candidate | Spent |
| Tom Kean | $1,144,244 |
| Source:New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission[6] | |
Incumbent Governor Thomas Kean was unopposed in the Republican primary election.
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republican | Thomas Kean (incumbent) | 151,259 | 100.00 | |
| Total votes | 151,259 | 100.00 | ||
| Primary campaign finance activity | |
|---|---|
| Candidate | Spent |
| Peter Shapiro | $1,161,161 |
| John Russo | $1,134,504 |
| Thomas F. X. Smith | $1,058,851 |
| Kenneth Gibson | $987,835 |
| Robert Del Tufo | $737,094 |
| Elliot Greenspan | $600 |
| Source:New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission[6] | |
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Democratic | Peter Shapiro | 101,243 | 31.02 | |
| Democratic | John F. Russo | 86,827 | 26.60 | |
| Democratic | Kenneth A. Gibson | 85,293 | 26.13 | |
| Democratic | Stephen B. Wiley | 27,914 | 8.55 | |
| Democratic | Robert Del Tufo | 19,742 | 6.05 | |
| Democratic | Elliot Greenspan | 5,834 | 1.65 | |
| Total votes | 326,403 | 100.00 | ||
Kean was riding on high popularity ratings from voters on account of the good economic situation of the state in the 1980s including a surplus in the state budget.[10]
His efforts to aid depressed cities throughUrban Enterprise Zones and reaching out to groups not typically associated with the Republicans includingAfrican Americans and labor unions led to endorsements from black ministers,Coretta Scott King,[11] theAFL–CIO, andThe New York Times.[12][13]
Shapiro ran on a platform of reducingcar insurance rates, the state's high property taxes, and improvement of the environment but his struggles of fundraising due to New Jersey being located in two expensivemedia markets (New York City andPhiladelphia) and Kean's momentum left his campaign little-received.[12]
| Poll source | Date(s) administered | Sample size | Margin of error | Peter Shapiro (D) | Tom Kean (R) | Undecided |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Star-Ledger/Eagleton[14][not specific enough to verify] | August 15–25, 1985 | 586 RV | ±4.1% | 13% | 68% | 19% |
| Star-Ledger/Eagleton[14][not specific enough to verify] | Sept. 29–Oct. 8, 1985 | 982 LV | ±3.2% | 16% | 67% | 17% |
| Primary campaign finance activity | |
|---|---|
| Candidate | Spent |
| Tom Kean | $2,254,971 |
| Peter Shapiro | $1,980,213 |
| Source:New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission[6] | |
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republican | Thomas Kean (incumbent) | 1,372,631 | 69.58% |  20.12 | |
| Democratic | Peter Shapiro | 578,402 | 29.32% | 20.06 | |
| Independent | Rodger Headrick | 8,537 | 0.43% | N/A | |
| Libertarian | Virginia Flynn | 4,710 | 0.24% | 0.14 | |
| Socialist Workers | Mark Satinoff | 3,703 | 0.19% | 0.12 | |
| Socialist Labor | Julius Levin | 2,740 | 0.14% | 0.05 | |
| Communist | George M. Fishman | 1,901 | 0.10% | N/A | |
| Majority | 794,402 | 40.26% | |||
| Turnout | 1,972,624 | ||||
| Republicanhold | Swing | ||||
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| County | Kean % | Kean votes | Shapiro % | Shapiro votes | Other % | Other votes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Atlantic | 69.1% | 38,477 | 29.8% | 16,611 | 1.1% | 608 |
| Bergen | 71.5% | 181,238 | 27.8% | 70,525 | 0.6% | 1,554 |
| Burlington | 68.7% | 56,573 | 30.5% | 25,078 | 0.9% | 696 |
| Camden | 60.9% | 70,374 | 38.1% | 43,960 | 0.9% | 1,173 |
| Cape May | 74.7% | 23,331 | 24.5% | 7,665 | 0.8% | 239 |
| Cumberland | 66.4% | 21,017 | 31.8% | 10,065 | 1.8% | 570 |
| Essex | 66.9% | 121,685 | 31.2% | 56,694 | 1.8% | 3,383 |
| Gloucester | 63.6% | 35,424 | 35.3% | 19,662 | 1.2% | 640 |
| Hudson | 65.1% | 88,165 | 34.1% | 46,195 | 0.8% | 1,160 |
| Hunterdon | 75.4% | 17,875 | 22.7% | 5,388 | 1.9% | 453 |
| Mercer | 63.2% | 53,562 | 35.6% | 30,212 | 1.2% | 994 |
| Middlesex | 65.8% | 113,020 | 33.1% | 56,815 | 1.0% | 1,804 |
| Monmouth | 72.9% | 109,238 | 26.4% | 39,529 | 0.7% | 1,084 |
| Morris | 78.4% | 85,189 | 21.0% | 22,847 | 0.4% | 566 |
| Ocean | 73.7% | 90,670 | 25.1% | 30,948 | 1.2% | 1,455 |
| Passaic | 69.8% | 70,896 | 28.8% | 29,263 | 1.4% | 1,429 |
| Salem | 64.9% | 12,376 | 33.7% | 6,417 | 1.4% | 270 |
| Somerset | 75.6% | 44,502 | 23.1% | 13,601 | 1.3% | 761 |
| Sussex | 77.7% | 22,109 | 21.1% | 5,998 | 1.2% | 346 |
| Union | 73.3% | 102,411 | 25.1% | 35,060 | 1.5% | 2,187 |
| Warren | 70.4% | 14,499 | 28.5% | 5,869 | 1.0% | 219 |
Counties that flipped from Democratic to Republican
When Gov. Thomas H. Kean, a Republican, ran for re-election in 1985, he won by a landslide, with 564 of the state's 567 towns. Roosevelt was one of the three that voted against him. (The others were two tiny boroughs in Camden County: Audubon Park and Chesilhurst.)
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