Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Dem Gubernatorial Candidate’s Cheating Scandal Widens As Polling Lead Evaporates(New Jersey)
Trending Politics ^ | 9/30/2025 | Cullen McCue

Posted on 09/30/2025 8:23:40 AM PDT by Signalman

The cheating scandal surrounding U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ) and her time at the U.S. Naval Academy has widened after her husband, Jason, also appears to have been implicated, according to documents reviewed by the New York Post.

Last week, a bombshell report from the New Jersey Globe revealed that Sherrill was barred from walking with her class at the U.S. Naval Academy in 1994 due to her implication in a sweeping cheating scandal that implicated more than 130 midshipmen. A copy of the commencement program from May 25, 1994, which was obtained by the outlet, did not include Sherrill’s name.

The congresswoman told The Globe that she was barred from the ceremony after failing to report classmates who had been involved in the scandal. “I didn’t turn in some of my classmates, so I didn’t walk, but graduated and was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Navy, serving for nearly ten years with the highest level of distinction and honor,” Sherrill said.

However, Sherrill’s campaign rejected a request for a public inspection of any disciplinary records dating back to her time at the academy. The congresswoman’s alleged involvement in the scandal has become a central point of the closely watched race, as she has routinely made her military service a central theme of her campaign.

“Why wasn’t Mikie Sherrill allowed to walk at her Naval Academy graduation? She admits knowing about a cheating scandal but won’t release the records that could tell the full story. Voters deserve the truth,” Ciattarelli posted on X Monday alongside the hashtag, “ReleaseTheRecords.”

The scandal revolved around answers to an electrical engineering exam that were shared by some midshipmen with their classmates in 1992. Two dozen of Sherrill’s classmates were expelled, and one of those involved said in 2002 that he thought more than 400 out of the 663 midshipmen who took the exam had seen copies of it in advance.

The revelations generated national outrage at the time, leading to congressional hearings and an internal investigation, which ultimately lead to the resignation of Rear Admiral Thomas C. Lynch, the superintendent at Annapolis, and widespread debate over the storied academy’s code of conduct. The academy subsequently undertook significant reforms to strengthen its academic integrity system and restore public trust.

According to an explosive follow-up report from the New York Post, Sherrill’s husband, Jason Hedberg, was among about four dozen midshipmen who about four dozen midshipmen who sued senior officials at the Naval Academy, Navy and Pentagon in 1994 in an attempt to block the Honor Board at Annapolis from deciding whether they should be dismissed from the academy.

“In compliance with the orders of their superior military officers, each named plaintiff was compelled to make inculpatory statements to Navy Inspector General investigators,” read the complaint, which argued that the cadets were denied due process.

Details of any “inculpatory statements” by Hedberg are unclear, though his name does, however, appear in the academy’s 1994 commencement program. This suggests that he, unlike his wife, was cleared to take part in exercises roughly three months after the lawsuit was filed.

A source from a “rival campaign” cast doubt on Sherrill’s claims of only being barred for refusing to turn in classmates while speaking with the New York Post. “Nobody, including Mikie Sherrill, was barred from graduation ceremonies for covering for their friends,”the individual, who has reviewed the documents, claimed. “That’s a bunch of bulls***. Midshipmen were, however, punished for lying to Naval investigators.”

Sherrill — who has continuously refused to release her academy disciplinary records — has denied any wrongdoing. “The fact [GOP candidate] Jack Ciattarelli and MAGA Republicans are going after Mikie’s family is sick and desperate — Jason graduated [and] served honorably as a Naval Officer,” Sherril’s campaign communications director Sean Higgins told The Post.

The scandal erupted as the New Jersey gubernatorial race tightens significantly. One recent survey from National Research found Ciattarelli leading 46 percent-45 percent in a two-way race, a figure that includes a 21-point lead among voters not registered with either major party. That poll was followed up by a survey from Emerson College on Wednesday, which found the race tied.

These polls come after Sherill held a sizable 8.8 percent lead in the RealClearPolitics polling average last week, which has since declined to just above six percent.


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: governor; newjersy; trendingpolitics
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-31 next last

1 posted on 09/30/2025 8:23:40 AM PDT by Signalman
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Signalman

Dems cheat, it’s what they do. She’ll cheat in the upcoming election as well. Dem voters are just too stupid to see cheating as a problem.


2 posted on 09/30/2025 8:29:27 AM PDT by brownsfan (It's going to take real, serious, hard times to wake the American public.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

Now is the time to hit her on the LBGT stuff. She is all in on that BS.


3 posted on 09/30/2025 8:31:09 AM PDT by iamgalt
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

Now is the time to hit her on the LBGT stuff. She is all in on that BS.


4 posted on 09/30/2025 8:31:15 AM PDT by iamgalt
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

Now is the time to hit her on the LBGT stuff. She is all in on that BS.


5 posted on 09/30/2025 8:31:16 AM PDT by iamgalt
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

well, we know the NJ Demonics won’t fail to support her because she’s a lying cheat—— that’s the foundation of the whole damned party.


6 posted on 09/30/2025 8:32:32 AM PDT by Segovia (https://townhall.com/columnists/kevinmccullough/2025/07/06/fossil-fooled-lives-vs-lies-n2659950)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

well, we know the NJ Demonics won’t fail to support her because she’s a lying cheat—— that’s the foundation of the whole damned party.


7 posted on 09/30/2025 8:32:38 AM PDT by Segovia (https://townhall.com/columnists/kevinmccullough/2025/07/06/fossil-fooled-lives-vs-lies-n2659950)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

“...who sued senior officials at the Naval Academy...”


I’m surprised any court would take such a case. This wasn’t a criminal matter. A military board would insist on officers telling the truth. Anyone found to be lying would’ve/should’ve been booted out.


8 posted on 09/30/2025 8:32:52 AM PDT by Twotone ( What's the difference between a politician & a flying pig? The letter "F.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

When posing with recent young people accepted into the naval academy, she didn’t include her two kids that somehow got accepted, 9% acceptance rate.
Rule 608. A Witness’s Character for Truthfulness or Untruthfulness
(a) Reputation or Opinion Evidence. A witness’s credibility may be attacked or supported by testimony about the witness’s reputation for having a character for truthfulness or untruthfulness, or by testimony in the form of an opinion about that character. But evidence of truthful character is admissible only after the witness’s character for truthfulness has been attacked.
Why doesn’t she dispute these things?
>Because it’s all true


9 posted on 09/30/2025 8:33:23 AM PDT by tumblindice (America's founding fathers: all armed conservatives)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Segovia

Cheatocrats

Cheating since the invention of mail in ballot fraud in 1864

Cheatocrats, Cheating is the only way they can win.


10 posted on 09/30/2025 8:34:03 AM PDT by cuz1961
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: Twotone

I don’t see how any of this disqualifies her as a New Jersey politician.


11 posted on 09/30/2025 8:34:35 AM PDT by Col Frank Slade
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: brownsfan

“Dem voters are just too stupid to see cheating as a problem.”

Cheating is a virtue to democrats.


12 posted on 09/30/2025 8:35:15 AM PDT by Bonemaker (invictus maneo)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: brownsfan

“Dem voters are just too stupid to see cheating as a problem.”

Cheating is a virtue to democrats.


13 posted on 09/30/2025 8:35:20 AM PDT by Bonemaker (invictus maneo)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: brownsfan

“Dem voters are just too stupid to see cheating as a problem.”

Cheating is a virtue to democrats.


14 posted on 09/30/2025 8:35:20 AM PDT by Bonemaker (invictus maneo)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: brownsfan

“Dem voters are just too stupid to see cheating as a problem.”

Cheating is a virtue to democrats.


15 posted on 09/30/2025 8:35:20 AM PDT by Bonemaker (invictus maneo)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

Is her opponent a RINO...or a real Republican?


16 posted on 09/30/2025 8:38:40 AM PDT by Gay State Conservative (Import The Third World,Become The Third World)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: brownsfan

Newark, Hudson County, Camden, and other NJ cities have been cesspools of corruption for a century or more. The question arises: will the US Department of Justice take effective measures to stem voter fraud? Remember that President Trump spends his summers in NJ, so he has a particular interest in that state. Attorney General Pam Bondi knows that Jeanine Pirro is waiting in the wings as her replacement, thus she may be motivated to crack down or find herself permanently back in Florida.


17 posted on 09/30/2025 8:38:47 AM PDT by Wallace T.
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: brownsfan

If a candidate for NJ office is not cheating the voters will know something is wrong with them.


18 posted on 09/30/2025 8:39:14 AM PDT by frithguild (The warmth and goodness of Gaia is a nuclear reactor in the Earth's core that burns Thorium)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Twotone

IIRC cadets at the service academies are subject to the UCMJ just as are ordinary soldiers,sailors and Airmen.


19 posted on 09/30/2025 8:41:15 AM PDT by Gay State Conservative (Import The Third World,Become The Third World)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: Signalman

I hope for the best for NJ and that she loses. Unfortunately here in NYS we have Hochul and Mandami - it’s going to hell as faster that CA.


20 posted on 09/30/2025 8:43:14 AM PDT by 1Old Pro
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-31 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson