The lunatics in Trenton were busy in 2024, from Governor Phil Murphy on down. A whole slew of new legislation that they passed and signed in 2024 took effect this past week, on January 1.
Here are a few of the worst offenders…
- The minimum wage goes up – for the seventh year in a row. This is thanks to a law passed in 2019 that allows the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development to set a new minimum wage every year after 2024 based on data from the Consumer Price Index. This is crushing not just to small businesses, but to workers competing for minimum wage jobs as employers cut positions to save.
- New 2.6 cent/per gallon gas tax hike – kicking off five more years of hikes. This was done, once again, under the guise of improving transportation. But we’ve been there, done that, starting with the first gas tax hikes Steve Sweeney championed while he was Senate President. And our transportation system couldn’t be much worse. We call BS.
- The “Freedom to Read Groom” Act gives school employees full immunity to expose students to sexually explicit materials that would normally constitute a violation of the obscenities statute for minors. Enough said.
- Basic math, reading, and writing proficiency requirements ELIMINATED for new NJ teachers seeking certification. Thanks to A1669, the State Board of Education is now prohibited from requiring new teachers seeking certification in New Jersey to complete “a commissioner-approved test of basic reading, writing, and mathematics skills.” Dumbing down standards is a poor way to “solve” the teacher shortage, and our students will be the ones to suffer.
The drop in common sense and the level of lunacy underlying each of these bills is off the charts… Truly.
Common sense may be common among us regular citizens of New Jersey, but it’s in very short supply among the political elites being elected to Trenton. And as a result, we get patently bad and dangerous lawmaking like this.
The power of the Common Sense Club Membership is not just finding a community of other common sense New Jerseyans so you don’t feel so alone amidst the noise of the media elite, but it’s also about empowering ACTION and VOLUME. We’re calling out the BS. Again, and again, and again. And we’re voting. And it’s making waves.
Thanks to the message we sent in November, I expect (if they’re smart) that these folks in Trenton will hold back some of the craziness in hopes of being reelected. Hopefully that means we can expect fewer bad bills to take effect January 1, 2026.
We’re taking back Trenton and New Jersey.
It starts with us! And it’s already underway.