We preface this endorsement by addressing the elephant in the 9th District: Billy Prempeh, the Republican candidate for that North Jersey congressional seat, swears that he is neither a member nor an advocate of QAnon.
So about that infamous photo that Prempah posted on Facebook during his first run at Rep. Bill Pascrell’s job in 2020, when he posed with a beaming visage alongside a “Q” banner while leaning into a jubilant young woman wearing a “Q” crown: That was a mere youthful indiscretion. Two years ago.
He says he wasn’t aware that QAnon was on the FBI’s terrorist list, he doesn’t remember why he used their motto (“Where we go one, we go all!”) as his caption, he had no clue why he would attract such people in the first place, and he would never knowingly hang out with lizard-brained paranoiacs who believe Q’s theory the country is governed by satanic pedophiles who eat children.
Just the same, the 32-year-old from Paterson tells us that all the “idiots” who desecrated the Capitol and sought to kill lawmakers on Jan. 6, 2021 -- QAnon and other assorted barbarians who worship Donald Trump – are “being denied the right of speedy and fair trials.”
You heard right: Even though hundreds have pled guilty, Prempeh objects to these rioters being treated “like terrorists in Guantanamo Bay,” and decries how “we’re dragging it through the mud. . . .not just to demonize the Republican Party and split the country, but to parade what has happened as the most negative thing that’s ever happened in our country.”
And in Prempeh’s final analysis, Trump bears no responsibility for the brutality that led to the deaths of 5 cops and injured 140 more, and the media is trying to “twist” all of this into “something sensational.”
It makes you ask: At a time when our nation faces profound domestic danger, why would the voters of Bergen, Passaic and Hudson Counties recall a recognized stalwart of our democracy and replace him with MAGA Muppet living in an alternate reality?
That question is rhetorical. We endorse Bill Pascrell for a 14th term, because the absence of a serious opponent makes this a choice between courageous governance and a smoldering pile of incoherent talking points.
Billy Prempeh, a candidate for Congress in New Jersey's 9th District, posed with QAnon members during his 2020 candidacy and posted the photo on his Facebook account.
At 85, Pascrell has lost none of the vitality that made him one of the most important figures in the New Jersey delegation. It’s also true that he is unapologetically partisan and not exactly a bridge builder, but if there is a political fight, Pascrell always runs toward it.
He replaced the immortal John Lewis as the chairman of the Oversight Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee, which has oversight of all revenues, including taxation, Social Security and Medicare. As such, he has been a champion for all consumers, but especially for seniors and the poor. On other big issues -- tax fairness, protecting and fortifying social security, voting rights, and fighting corruption – New Jersey may not have a sturdier advocate.
In the past session, he has been especially cranky and effective.
Pascrell was the first member of Congress to demand accountability at the IRS – calling for the firing of its commissioner after the delay of tax returns for 30 million Americans – and in the end his oversight hearings laid the groundwork for strengthening the IRS to staff up and go after rich tax cheats.
He went after giant oil companies for price gouging and stock buybacks, issuing a report that exposed their failure to ramp up production to meet demand, aggravating the current crisis. It resulted in a price gouging prevention bill that passed the House but still sits in the Senate.
“And we have 400 bills over in the Senate waiting to be acted upon,” Pascrell reminded us last week. “So you know which side of the building is trying to do its job.”
He also sponsored the House-passed bill that banned assault weapons, and another bill that allows the ATF to use an electronic database – instead of its current paper-based system -- to track down guns used in crimes.
He has been a relentless watchdog at the US Postal Service, calling for the firing of Postmaster General Louis DeJoy after reports that employees deliberately delayed mail service during the 2020 election, and making criminal referrals alleging that DeJoy and Trump subverted elections.
He was the first voice calling for the expulsion of members who supported the insurrection, the first to demand the criminal prosecution of Trump, and the first to seek disbarment of Attorney General William Barr.
And he was the first to call for Justice Clarence Thomas to resign after revelations that his wife worked to overturn the 2020 presidential election while Thomas heard election-related cases.
The list goes on. In the last session, it has been Beltway catechism: When the Biden Administration failed to examine or jettison corrupt or nihilistic Trump appointees – at the USPS, the IRS, the Social Security Administration, and others – it was always Pascrell banging on the podium first.
He speaks his mind – Pascrell was the first to call for Trump’s first impeachment and for the release of his tax returns – and he shrugs off blowback. Maybe that’s part of being from a safe district. But it’s also because Pascrell has authentic political courage.
It will take courage to protect a country under siege by domestic terror groups like QAnon, by elected officials and a former president seeking to subvert our democracy, by special interests that shovel billions into elections on every level, by ideologues who attack basic freedoms like a woman’s reproductive rights.
Count Prempah among them: He not only believes New Jersey’s law goes too far because “You have the ability to have an abortion post-birth – look it up,” he wants to defund Planned Parenthood, and he would vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act.
The threats against our democracy -- both foreign and domestic -- is not something we all saw coming. But Pascrell was among the first to recognize it, and it is inspiring that he still has his fastball. He needs to be sent back to Washington.
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