Seth Grossman sent voters a postcard that said “NJ MAGA Republicans” and laid out six points, including enforcing immigration laws and cutting back on legal immigration. “That’s how I won,” Grossman said. | Mary Schwalm/AP Photo Congressional nominee’s views on race causing headaches for New Jersey GOP

Seth Grossman isn’t apologizing.

Grossman, the surprise Republican nominee for Congress in New Jersey’s 2nd District, was caught on video during a GOP candidates forum this spring calling diversity “a bunch of crap and un-American.”


He’s now doubling down — tripling down, even — expressing views on race and opportunity that one local NAACP leader described as “cowering ignorance and an evasion of reality.”

This is the new reality New Jersey Republicans are facing in the era of President Donald Trump. Grossman, who has campaigned as an adherent to Trump, is running for the seat that’s been held for the past 24 years by moderate GOP Rep. Frank LoBiondo, one of a number of House Republicans retiring ahead of the midterm elections.

Grossman, who has shown little ability to raise funds, is running against Jeff Van Drew, a well-known conservative-leaning Democratic state senator. Van Drew not only has the strength of a well-funded South Jersey Democratic machine behind him, but will likely have the help of national Democrats as well.

“If the national Democrats try to paint me as a Nazi, KKK, white supremacist, I think that the truth of my character will overcome the money they spend to try to destroy me,” Grossman said in a phone interview.

Van Drew spokesman Michael Muller said the senator was “disappointed” by the comments Grossman has made.

“Senator Van Drew … feels our diversity plays a large role in our success as a nation,” Muller said in a statement. “Senator Van Drew wants to be a Congressman who embraces our diversity because that is the foundation of our country’s success for generations as a land of opportunity.”

Before Grossman became the nominee, Steve Stivers, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, had described the sprawling eight-county 2nd District as a “recruiting hole.” Now, the GOP is putting distance between itself and its own nominee, as state and national Republicans ask candidates up and down the ballot to disavow Grossman.

“Seth Grossman’s comments in the video do not reflect the values of the NJGOP,” Republican State Chairman Doug Steinhardt said in a statement. “We are a growing party with a diverse group of participants under our tent. Comments like those are contrary to our mission and have no place in the party that we are building.”

The 2nd District — the largest in the state — extends from the Jersey shore to the Delaware River, from the high-rise casinos of Atlantic City to tracts of farmland in Salem County. It’s a swing district on paper, having gone for Trump in 2016 and Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012. Though predominantly white, it has a larger minority population than any of the state’s four other GOP-held districts.

Grossman is well-known in South Jersey political circles. An Atlantic City native, he served as a Council member there in the 1980s, and then an Atlantic County freeholder, and founded a neighborhood association. In 2013, he was Gov. Chris Christie’s sole Republican primary challenger, getting about 8 percent of the vote. More recently, the conservative activist group Liberty and Prosperity, of which Grossman is executive director, sued the state to stop an arrangement that allows the Atlantic City casinos to make payments in lieu of taxes.

But his views on race hadn’t been highlighted until American Bridge 21st Century, a Democratic super PAC, went to a GOP candidates’ forum in Salem County and captured his remarks on tape.

“In my view, the best way to bring diversity to the Republican Party is for Republicans to openly say the whole idea of diversity is a bunch of crap and un-American. ... The constitution was designed to incorporate that idea in the Declaration of Independence that everybody is treated equally under the law,” Grossman said on the video, which was first provided to The Philadelphia Inquirer. “Now what diversity has become has been an excuse by Democrats — communists and socialists, basically — to say that we’re not all created equal. If someone is lesser qualified, they’ll get a job anyway, they’ll get into college anyway, because of the tribe that they’re with.”

Though Grossman is unsure of the motivations of the person who asked the question — he thinks it was either a Democratic plant or someone aligned with one of his primary rivals — he called it an “ambush” and “gotcha” question.

“The context was you had four white guys debating each other, and it was maybe my interpretation, but it seemed to be an accusatory tone: ’You guys, as the face of the Republican Party, what can you do to bring more diversity to the Republican party?’ … I found that to be an insulting question,’” Grossman said during a 40-minute phone conversation with POLITICO. “Maybe it was that. Maybe it was because i was hungry — it was an hour-and-a-half debate. But I responded the way I did.”

During the interview, Grossman elaborated on his views on race. He said he believes African-Americans in New Jersey won the civil rights struggle by the early 20th century, and that minority groups have been kept down by social programs put in place ostensibly to help them.

“I grew up in Atlantic City. I lived in the times of a vibrant African-American community with political power, with economic clout, with respect and complete integration,” Grossman said.

Grossman said that as an Atlantic City Council member in 1987, he, African-American council members and community leaders were planning an observance to mark the 20th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination and were “embarrassed” to learn the city did not have a monument honoring the slain civil rights leader.

“In a way, everybody was embarrassed to find here’s a black mayor, a half black council and all this political power and there was no monument to Martin Luther King,” Grossman said. “I think the reason for that was African Americans had won their civil rights battle in the 1920s.”

The Ku Klux Klan was extremely active in the 1920s, including in New Jersey; Its South Jersey headquarters was in Egg Harbor Township, not far from Atlantic City.

“The narrative that’s being taught about how racist most of America was in the 1960s was a fake narrative,” Grossman said. “There needs to be a conversation about this. A political campaign is probably not the best way to have it, but we’re going under a false narrative. What I believe is that we have to go back to a society where we recognize you have a freedom to fail as well as a freedom to succeed.”

Atlantic City Council Member Kaleem Shabazz, who is also president of the city’s chapter of the NAACP, said he finds it hard to believe Grossman buys into his own statements.

“I know Seth. I really like Seth as an individual. But it’s frightening to think that he has the possibility of being a federal officeholder with his astounding and cowering ignorance and evasion of reality,” Shabazz said. “He’s not a dumb person. Seth is educated. He’s a lawyer, and he knows better. And that’s the reason I’m concerned: He knows better and he plays on people‘s lack of attention of facts and the fact that people are hyped up on fear and emotion.”

Grossman also said he believes it was a mistake to open up the U.S. to more immigrants in the 1960s.

“Until 1965, America took in 300,000 legal immigrants a year. Ted Kennedy changed everything in 1965 by increasing that number to somewhere near 1.2 million a year … and that made it impossible to enforce any immigration laws,” Grossman said.

Grossman said he wants lower immigration numbers.

“I have no objection to changing the mix of immigrants in 1965. That was a very good idea. The immigration laws that we had were based on the America of 1920. And obviously, in 1965, there was a need to change the mix to reflect the reality of the 1965 world,” he said. “But what I thought — and I think what many Americans think — was a tragic mistake was increasing the numbers by 400 percent.”

Democrats are already trying to force New Jersey Republicans to repudiate Grossman’s statements.

“His views are repugnant, and the National Republican Congressional Committee should rescind their endorsement of his campaign immediately,” American Bridge 21st Century spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement. “Other New Jersey Republicans should also denounce Grossman, including [Senate candidate] Bob Hugin, Congressman Tom MacArthur, Congressman Leonard Lance, [and congressional candidates] Jay Webber and John McCann — and if they don't, they should expect voters to hold them accountable for refusing to speak out."

For all the backlash Grossman’s comments are getting, he says he — not the party leaders — has his finger on the pulse of Republican voters in the district, which he demonstrated by winning a five-way primary by campaigning on a strict pro-Trump message.

“The other candidates were all hedging. 'Well, I like Trump. I wish he wouldn’t say this, wouldn’t do that.' And I saw an opportunity. The opportunity was to be clearly, unconditionally supporting Trump and the Trump agenda,” Grossman said.

Grossman sent voters a postcard that said “NJ MAGA Republicans” and laid out six points, including enforcing immigration laws and cutting back on legal immigration.

“That’s how I won,” Grossman said. “They call it the magic postcard.”