The 2012 United States Senate election in New Jersey took place on November 6, 2012, concurrently with the 2012 U.S. presidential election as well as other elections to the United States Senate and House of Representatives and various state and local elections.
Incumbent senator Bob Menendez became the first Hispanic-American U.S. senator to represent New Jersey in January 2006 when former U.S. senator Jon Corzine appointed him to the seat, having resigned to become governor of New Jersey after winning in 2005. In 2006, Menendez defeated Republican state senator Thomas Kean, Jr. with 53.3% of votes.
Menendez won re-election to a second full term, becoming the first Democratic Senate candidate to carry Somerset County since Bill Bradley in 1984. This is the only time since 1976 that a candidate for this seat received over 55% of the vote. This election marked the first time that someone won this seat by double digits since 1976 as well. Menendez outperformed President Obama in the concurrent presidential race by 0.62%.
Three debates were scheduled. The first debate took place on October 4, 2012, at Montclair State University. Menendez and Kyrillos participated. The second took place on October 10 at NJ 101.5 studios, Trenton NJ The third was to take place on October 17 at Mercer County Community College External links
County that flipped from Republican to Democratic
Menendez won nine of 12 congressional districts, including three that elected Republicans to the House.
Official campaign websites (Archived)