A new poll finds the Republican candidate opening up a significant lead in New Jersey's 3rd District congressional race.
The Monmouth Poll released Tuesday has Tom MacArthur up by 10 points over Democrat Aimee Belgard.
“This has arguably been the nastiest race in New Jersey this year. While both sides have taken shots at each other, national Democrats have weighed in with some controversial attacks against MacArthur. It doesn’t look like they worked,” said independent Monmouth University Polling Institute director Patrick Murray. “This is not turning out to be the horse race that Democrats had hoped.”
It's a race for an open seat with current Rep. Jon Runyan, a Republican, not seeking re-election. Democrats nationally have seen the race as one of their best chances to pick up a House seat.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has spent more than $1 million on ads blasting MacArthur.
The Republican, who is largely paying for his own campaign, has also aired ads attacking Belgard's character.
The telephone poll of 423 randomly selected likely voters in the district has a sampling error of plus or minus 5 percentage points.
