A unique power that New Jersey gives local partisan officials, to design primary ballots giving preferential treatment to favored candidates, is being challenged in a lawsuit as an unconstitutional form of political discrimination.
The federal claim, filed Monday by six defeated politicians and a consortium of progressive groups, offers an unusual twist on one of the prevailing complaints from the good-government movement: The people who run the two major parties have way too much power to repel the sort of outsider or insurgent candidates who would be more committed to fixing the system.
This may be nowhere more true than in New Jersey, where the Democratic and Republican party bosses in the 21 counties have an exceptional ability to steer election outcomes.
Endorsements from these local political machines come with a tangible and enormous benefit. The primary ballots are designed so the blessed legislative and other down-ballot candidates appear on what's known as "the county line" — generally the first column, directly under the names of the party's incumbents or best-known candidates for statewide offices including governor or senator.
Sometimes, the county bosses put their endorsed candidate in one column and all the others in a separate column, causing confusion and double-voiding that results in the ballot being tossed.
A study of last year's primaries by Rutgers sociologist Julia Sass Rubin, focused on congressional candidates who got the preferred treatment in some counties but not others, concluded the county line boosted a politician's vote share by an astonishing (and very often dispositive) 35 percent.
Working assiduously to secure the county line is almost certainly a major reason why no incumbent state legislator has lost a primary in the state since 2009.
The suit wants federal Judge Freda Wolfson of Newark to order the counties to design their primary ballots like almost all the others in the country, with all candidates for a particular office grouped together. It alleges the current system violates the free speech and equal protection rights of the disfavored candidates.
State party bosses, who have been fighting an earlier version of the suit since last summer, say the power over the ballot design is within their discretion.
"This antiquated practice is truly indefensible," countered Sue Altman, who runs New Jersey Working Families, one of the plaintiffs. "If we learned anything over the last four years, it's that our democracy is fragile and requires a vigorous effort to maintain. This expansive coalition is fighting to make democracy stronger in New Jersey. Up and down the state advocates agree: It is long past time for real, competitive primary elections. Our democracy is at stake. This is a matter of equity and whose voice counts."
"New Jersey's use of the line is a voter suppression tactic, used to pre-determine election outcomes and diminish the voice of voters," said Jesse Burns, executive director of the state League of Women Voters chapter.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
____
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.