Republican frontrunner to face Andy Kim is admitted shoplifter

TOMS RIVER - Kate Gibbs, a leading Republican candidate to challenge Democratic incumbent Andy Kim in New Jersey’s 3rd Congressional District, has a history of arrests and charges for municipal offenses that range from shoplifting to marijuana possession, according to court records obtained by the Asbury Park Press.

Gibbs, 33, of Lumberton, is one of at least three Republican candidates expected to appear Saturday, behind closed doors, before the Ocean County Republican Party’s screening committee in Toms River. The candidates will each make a case for why they deserve the influential GOP organization’s endorsement.

Gibbs, who served one term on the Burlington County Board of Freeholders, from Jan. 1, 2016 to Dec. 31, 2018, already has received the endorsement of the Burlington County Republican Committee.

At the age of 20 on Nov. 21, 2006, Gibbs was charged with shoplifting after police said she stole various articles of clothing valued at about $80 from a Kohl’s department store in Cherry Hill. Gibbs placed the clothes in a shopping bag and left the store without paying, according to a police report of the incident.

New GOP HQ: Ocean County Republicans open new headquarters in Toms River

Gibbs pleaded guilty to the charge in January 2007 and paid more than $280 in fines and court costs in Cherry Hill Municipal Court. The future freeholder also was banned from Kohl’s, according to court documents.

On July 22, 2008, when Gibbs was 22, she was charged in Long Beach Township with possessing less than 50 grams of marijuana and 5 grams of hashish with intent to use drug paraphernalia. Gibbs made no plea to possession and pleaded not guilty to intent to use drug paraphernalia in Long Beach Township Municipal Court. Under the first-offender law, the case was conditionally discharged and the case was ultimately dismissed in May 2010, according to court records.

On July 19, 2014, when Gibbs was 28, she was charged in Sea Bright for prohibited possession of alcohol on the beach. The next month, she pleaded guilty in Sea Bright Municipal Court and paid a $283 fine.

As a student at American University in Washington, Gibbs was sued by her landlord on nine occasions between 2006 and 2008 for failure to pay rent on an apartment she shared with a friend. On three occasions, Gibbs entered into a default judgment with her landlord for unpaid rent and was notified of the risk of eviction for nonpayment. Gibbs was dismissed from the six other suits after the rent owed was paid.

“As a young woman, I made some poor choices, trusted the wrong people, experimented with pot, and did some immature things,” Gibbs said. “It’s embarrassing and I’m not proud of it, but I won’t run from it either. I own this. The mistakes I made then, helped me become who I am today: An independent, responsible, successful young woman who is running for Congress because we need more real, genuine people representing us in Washington.

"I’m incredibly encouraged by the support I’ve received talking to Republicans throughout Ocean County today. It means a lot to me.”

[ The trusted place to find the best home service providers. Find local pros. ]

While Gibbs said she takes responsibility for her past run-ins with the law, the former freeholder said she had been unaware of the lawsuits filed against her when she was a college student. After her campaign was questioned about the litigation, Gibbs said she contacted her old college roommate, who had been responsible for handling the rent. She has since discovered that there had in fact been legal action she was not informed about at the time. She expressed regret over the matter.

Ocean GOP chairman: ‘Not happy’

Ocean County Republican Party Chairman Frank B. Holman III said he was recently informed of those incidents and was “not happy about it.”

Nevertheless, Holman said he did not think Gibbs should be disqualified from future public service for what he said were “some stupid things” she did in her youth.

“It doesn’t help Kate, certainly I do think she has matured,” Holman said.

Since Holman was elected county chairman last May, he has sought to make the recruitment of more women and young people — to run as Republican candidates for elected office in Ocean County — a top priority of his chairmanship.

Gibbs meets both criteria and remains a strong candidate for Congress in his view, he said. However, he added, the party’s screening committee would have to reach its own conclusion on Saturday and that the GOP’s county council would have the last word at its annual convention on the night of March 4 at the Days Hotel in Toms River.

“I’m only the chairman, and we have a screening process, and we have a convention, where there will be opinions expressed,” Holman said.

Toms River students pick cotton, lie on dirty floor: How should slavery be taught?

Freeholder Jack Kelly, who chairs the screening committee, expressed surprise when he was reached for comment Thursday afternoon, but he declined further comment.

Gibbs spent part of Thursday evening making phone calls to screening committee members to apologize and explain her past, she said.

She told a Press reporter Thursday night that mistakes are made in life and she had learned from its lessons. She made the argument that she had built a successful career — she is deputy director of Engineers Labor-Employer Cooperative, which represents the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 825 in providing statewide opportunities between employers, contractors and workers — and had served honorably in public life, and that she should not be defined by her youth.

However, she conceded that participation in the public arena meant she had to answer for it and said that one of her first calls she made Thursday night was to answer to her mother, whom she said had never been told about her past.

OC GOP may split with Burlington

Two other candidates for the 3rd Congressional District seat are considered viable contenders in Ocean County, according to Holman.

David Richter, 53, the former CEO of Hill International, was originally the frontrunner to win the Republican nomination against Democratic incumbent Jeff Van Drew in the Garden State’s 2nd Congressional District. However, Van Drew switched parties and became a Republican with the enthusiastic support of President Donald Trump, after the congressman was one of two Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives to oppose impeachment.

Last month, Trump even traveled to Wildwood in Van Drew’s district to campaign for the converted sitting congressman.

In court: Former Ocean County GOP leader George Gilmore sentenced to year in federal prison

Richter now wants to compete for the Republican nomination for Congress in the 3rd.

A native of Burlington County, Richter spent most of his childhood living in Willingboro before his family moved to Cherry Hill, where he graduated high school. Ahead of his planned run in the 2nd Congressional District, Richter moved to Avalon. Since the Van Drew switch, he has said that his family will now seek a new home somewhere in the portion of Ocean County that includes the 3rd District — a sprawling region that begins on the banks of the Delaware River in Burlington County and extends east through the Pine Barrens to the Jersey Shore in Ocean County.

In the 2018 midterms, Kim narrowly defeated Republican incumbent Tom MacArthur in an election that produced a Democratic majority in the House.

“I am disappointed to learn about Kate’s criminal history,” Richter said Thursday. “I believe that everyone is entitled to second chances, and I believe Kate should be given the same opportunity. Unfortunately for her, Kate has chosen to run for Congress. In what is sure to be one of the most competitive races in the country, I doubt that Andy Kim and (House Speaker) Nancy Pelosi will be as forgiving.”

Community: How Toms River officials, Orthodox Jews learned to get along amid anti-Semitism

A third candidate in the internal Republican contest is Barnegat Mayor John J. Novak, 61, a social conservative, who ran unsuccessfully in 2016 as an independent candidate for freeholder in Ocean County and who is close to Holman.

After New Jersey became the second state in the nation after California to adopt a law that requires schools to teach about LGBTQ history, Novak used the bully pulpit of his municipal office to become a vocal opponent of the policy.

“(Parents) should have the right to opt their child out of that component of public education,” Novak said in September. “Sexual morals and spiritual beliefs are a parental function, not a governmental function.”

At the time, the Township Committee’s decision to weigh in on the matter was so divisive that it compelled Barnegat Police Chief Keith Germain to issue a statement that his department would continue to protect the rights of all people.

Erik Larsen has covered politics, crime and unusual events at the Jersey Shore for more than 20 years. Contact him at 732-682-9359, elarsen@gannettnj.com or on Twitter at @Erik_Larsen.