1997 Jersey City Mayoral election

The 1997 Jersey City Mayoral Election, a tense contest between incumbent mayor Bret Schundler and future Mayor Jerramiah Healy resulted in a 9% win for the mayor that nearly resulted in him being reelected in the First round.

Accused of using divisive campaign tactics Healy's goal during the first round was to force the Popular Schundler into a runnoff—using his endorsment from the Hudson County Democratic organization as a means to attempt to force out the republican mayor.

However this nearly failed, with official results having Schundler 5 votes over the 50%+1 requirement to avoid a runoff. Despite this, Healy sued, and got 7 illegal votes thrown out after a short legal battle—in doing so forcing a runoff between himself and the mayor.

On election night and throughout the runoff, Schundler—an Evangelical social & Fiscal conservative—was uncharacteristically angry. Threatening to sue for defamation over the aforementioned attacks; during the runof Schundler Shifted to negative campaigning against Healy to win

Further, Schundler never believed he would be forced into a runoff, buying him a complacency that he did not have in the runoff. Instead, he spent his warchest—outgunning Healy sending 10 mailings over 2 weeks in addition to ads as Healy required the HCDO to pay for his one mailing.

Contributing to this was the heavy spending the HCDO & Healy nearly regaining the Jersey City council in the June 10th Runoffs, holding Schundler's slate to a slim 1 vote 5-4 Majority on the council.

This, plus Schundler moving on to negative attacks for the runoff, such as his "nebulous economic plan" and criticizing Healy's proposal to give police greater authority for pat-down searches allowed him to expand his 9% margin to a 16.7% in the runoff—Beating back Healy to secure a second four year term.