Republican challenger to Van Drew says manufacturing will rebuild nation, south Jersey
By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
OCEAN CITY – Bob Patterson has a conservative vision for the Second Congressional District.
Patterson, 66, of Ocean City, is challenging Democrat-turned-Republican incumbent Jeff Van Drew in the July 7 Republican primary for Congress.
A self-described life-long Republican and conservative who is pro-life, pro-border wall and pro-President Donald Trump, Patterson’s vision for the district revolves around rebuilding the economy here, or as he puts it, making “south Jersey great again.”
The COVID-19 pandemic has bolstered his long-held beliefs that manufacturing must return to the United States from China. He said that for all of the time Van Drew has served in government, from mayor to freeholder to state assemblyman and state senator and now to Congress, he has not improved the economy around him.
In the midst of the pandemic Van Drew recently joined other legislators’ calls to bring manufacturing back from China, but Patterson said he is a johnny-come-lately to the issue.
As a vice president for the U.S. Business and Industry Council, Patterson said he fought against trade deals, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and has “expressed alarm about China for a long time.”
“Of course the pandemic is a great illustration about why this has been a dangerous, ominous policy prescription of all this cozying up to China, letting all our manufacturing go over to a foreign power,” he said.
“I have argued for the longest time, even before the pandemic, that everything for our military ought to be made here in the United States using – as much as possible – U.S. materials, U.S. machine tools, vehicles, equipment, and made by American workers. That’s been a passion of mine for 10 years. That predates this pandemic and it applies to antibiotics, medicine, pharmaceuticals, medical equipment, even facemasks that we’ve had trouble producing when the pandemic hit.”
Patterson chided Van Drew for not doing more for the region.
“Mr. Van Drew has been in public office for 30 years? During those 30 years south Jersey has been losing population, losing jobs,” he said. “I’m glad Jeff has adopted this approach to China, but it is a little late. Where has he been for 30 years to reverse the decline in south Jersey?”
Patterson said rebuilding this area begins with supporting Trump’s plan to bring back manufacturing to the U.S.
“We have to reboot our whole manufacturing capability. If we are able to bring manufacturing back to the United States, there is going to be plenty of spillover to go into south Jersey,” Patterson said. “South Jersey is in an ideal location. We’re close to New York, we’re close to Philadelphia, we’re close to Washington, D.C. Housing is reasonable. It’s an ideal place to bring manufacturing.”
Pointing out that China is “way ahead” of the U.S. in telecommunications with giant Huawei, he called for resurrecting a type of Bell Labs that used to be based in New Jersey.
“Bell Labs was a tremendous economic engine and created all sorts of innovation in telecommunications. That’s just a tiny example of bringing manufacturing back,” he said.
He added he would support the HIRE Act. The legislation now in the Senate would “move 90 percent of federal agencies and jobs away from D.C. We would decentralize the federal government and move all these agencies to the heartland and areas that have been left behind. Maybe we bring National Institutes of Health to Vineland. Maybe we bring the FDA here. There are lots of different ways to go here. If I were elected I would introduce that bill on the House side,” he said.
If the area could bring back manufacturing and federal agencies, it would warrant “game-changing infrastructure projects,” he said. He said he’s argued for years about extending the PATCO high-speed rail line to Atlantic City to replace the slow New Jersey Transit trains. He suggested finishing Route 55 to bring it all the way to the Garden State Parkway and proposed the idea of a bridge from south Jersey to the Delmarva Peninsula.
“Now it’s interesting that Mr. Van Drew has the endorsement of the Sierra Club and the Sierra Club opposes virtually every public works project,” he said.
Calling voters
The restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic means Patterson has turned to the phones to call voters, but he is confident in that approach when he can’t go door to door or appear at GOP clubs.
“There is nothing better than a personal phone call to a specific voter,” he said. “It’s a time to hear the concerns of the voters and it’s an opportunity to introduce myself. I don’t have the name recognition. I just need to build my name recognition, get my platform out there and contrast – there is a huge contrast between Van Drew and Patterson. You couldn’t find a more stark contrast. Van Drew is a lifelong liberal who just recently reinvented himself as a Republican.”
“I know he likes to say he is moderate, but his voting record is really way off the GOP reservation,” Patterson said. “He voted against Trump’s border wall, cosponsored legislation to give amnesty to illegals, he voted with the liberals on gun control. And even cosponsored the Democratic resolution condemning Trump as a racist. And even since his conversion, he voted with the liberals on bringing back or revising the long-dead Equal Rights Amendment. And he’s also voted with corporate interests of favoring foreign labor over American labor.
“The contrast is very vivid,” he asserted. “I’m a solid conservative. Been a life-long Republican, I favor the border wall, I favor the Second Amendment, I’m pro-life and I have written extensively over the years against outsourcing, against our outsourcing all these production lines to China and places like Mexico, and I have fought for domestic manufacturing interests as well as the interest of American workers.”
When he talks to voters, he said, he hears that they want “someone who is going to stand up with them and their values in Washington.” He said “they’re happy to hear there is a conservative alternative they can vote for.”
Facing an incumbent
It is often difficult for challengers to compete against incumbents because of the natural advantage of being in office and ability to get into the media with their opinions and votes.
On top of that, county Republican leaders lined up behind Van Drew – after battling him for years as a Democrat – when he switched parties late last year and got President Trump’s support, including a rally in Wildwood in January.
Patterson doesn’t believe that will be enough for Van Drew.
“This is a stark contrast,” he said. “Normally in a Republican primary, the conservative candidate wins. Incumbency has huge advantages, but I don’t think those advantages are large enough to allow Van Drew to stand behind his liberal record.”
As for the endorsements of the county GOP leaders, he added, “I would say that endorsements don’t win elections. The Republican voters decide on July 7 who is going to be their nominee. Endorsements really don’t count on primary day. We have been focusing our attention on reaching out to the voters and there are a lot more voters in this district then there are officials who might give their endorsement to Mr. Van Drew.”
Patterson did mention his own endorsement to burnish his conservative bona fides. The New Jersey Right to Life PAC.
“Bob Patterson is the only pro-life candidate running in the Second Congressional District, and we are happy to endorse him,” Marie Tasy, executive director of New Jersey Right to Life PAC, said in a press release. “We are confident that Bob will always vote for pro-life legislation and against taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood’s abortion business.”
Patterson said though he may be working on improving his name recognition with voters, his campaign will be ready for the primary.
“We’ll have the tools and the money to get our message out and at the appropriate time we’ll connect with the voters and … basically hit this contrast between the liberal Van Drew and the conservative Patterson,” he said.
Born in Camden and raised in Cherry Hill, Patterson served in President George W. Bush’s administration as a senior speechwriter and worked at various think tanks including the Heritage Foundation. In addition to his work at the U.S. Business & Industry Council, he was a senior advisor and acting associate commissioner at the Social Security Administration. He ran unsuccessfully for the Congress in 2016 against incumbent Democrat Rep. Don Norcross in the First Congressional District, but lost.