Jennifer Beck

Jennifer Beck (born January 3, 1967) is an American Republican Party politician who served in the New Jersey State Senate representing the 11th Legislative District from 2012 to 2018. Prior to redistricting, she served in the Senate from 2008 to 2012 representing the 12th Legislative District, serving portions of Monmouth and Mercer counties. Beck represented the 12th District in the New Jersey General Assembly from 2006 to 2008.

Political career Beck is a former Republican Party fundraiser who served for six years on the Red Bank Borough Council, from 1999 to 2005.

In the 2007 general election, Beck won her bid for a seat in the New Jersey Senate, defeating incumbent Democrat Ellen Karcher despite being outspent by a nearly 7-to-1 margin. For the 2011 elections, Beck was moved into the 11th District where she beat Democrat Raymond Santiago by over 13 points.

In November 2008, a petition was launched to urge the 2009 Republican nominee for Governor of New Jersey to select Beck as his/her lieutenant governor. Nevertheless, on July 20, 2009, nominee Chris Christie announced that he had chosen Kimberly Guadagno, Monmouth County sheriff, to complete his campaign ticket as a candidate for lieutenant governor.

Described by NJ.com as "perhaps the biggest upset of the night", Beck lost her bid for re-election in 2017 to Democratic challenger Vin Gopal, in what was the third-most expensive of the 120 legislative races statewide, with total spending in excess of $4 million. The district had been represented only by Republicans since 1992. With the addition of heavily Democratic communities like Asbury Park in the 2011 apportionment, Democrats gained a 32%-23% margin over Republicans in numbers of registered voters. Democrats Joann Downey and Eric Houghtaling won the two Assembly seats in 2015 and Gopal's win over Beck by an Election Day count of 28,750 votes to 25,108 put all three District 11 seats in the hands of Democrats.

Election history