Stunning Hypocrisy: Funded by $40 Million from the Wealthiest Donor of All, Sean Spiller Decries His Opponents’ Wealthy Donors; the Most Non-Transparent Candidate Calls for Transparency.

Confronted with the reality that he was the only one of the six Democratic candidates absent from the debate stage for Sunday’s gubernatorial debate, NJEA President Sean Spiller is trying to turn his obvious weakness as a candidate into a virtue.  As Spiller’s poor polling shows, the reason for Spiller’s anemic fundraising is that he is not a popular candidate. Desperate to obscure this reality, Spiller now claims that his weak performance is due to his opponents courting wealthy donors while his campaign is funded by small donations. But this is laughable from a candidate who is backed by $40 million from the wealthiest donor of all: his own NJEA. Spiller calls for his opponents to be transparent about their donors, while the reality is that up until now, Spiller has been the most non-transparent candidate of all.  The hypocrisy is stunning — even for Sean Spiller.

Here are the facts:

By traditional measures, Spiller is an extremely weak candidate. He is polling a distant 5th in the most recent poll (trailing leader Mikie Sherrill by 28% to 10%), and unable to raise money from the voting public. As a result, Spiller is the only Democratic candidate not to qualify for matching funds and hence the debate. Here are the latest fundraising numbers from NJSpotlight News:

1. Rep. Mikie Sherrill – $9,164,162
2. Rep. Josh Gottheimer – $9,076,761
3. Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop – $8,981,804
4. Former-Senate President Steve Sweeney – $7,579,866
5. Newark Mayor Ras Baraka – $5,439,864
6. NJEA President Sean Spiller – $431,478

It’s less than a month from the June primary and Spiller has only raised 1% of the total of $40,673,935 raised by the six Democratic candidates for governor.  These numbers speak very loudly about the lack of public support for his run.

So Spiller took the pages of New Jersey Globe to turn his glaring weakness into a virtue.  In typical demagogic fashion, Spiller attributes his deficiency to not having “wealthy donors cutting huge checks:” Luxury apartment developers, Wall Street wealth, and even debate sponsors RWJ Barnabas and Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield.  (Of course, the reality is that large donors usually put their money behind candidates they think will win.)  Spiller then claims “my campaign is funded by hard working people who can contribute $10 or $25 or maybe even $250.”

This is laughable. Spiller’s hypocrisy is stunning. His entire run for governor is being funded by the wealthiest donor of all: the NJEA, which can tap into a pool of $135 million of teachers’ mandatory, annual dues.  So unlike any other candidate, Spiller can count on the infusion of $40 million to back his run for governor (via NJEA-run Super PAC Working New Jersey).  In one, fell swoop Spiller will “raise” as much money as all the other Democratic candidates combined.  Talk about wealthy donors cutting huge checks!

In a desperate attempt for a campaign slogan, Spiller goes on to decry the Super PACs supporting his opponents and calls for them to reveal their donors: “If there is nothing to hide, then #ShowUsTheMoney.” This, too, is laughable hypocrisy. Spiller claims that everyone knows where his Super PAC money comes from but the fact is that the funding of his run was shrouded in secrecy until it was exposed by Politico and Sunlight well after — even years after — the money was spent.

Even worse, up until an April 2025 NJ.com article, Spiller and NJEA leadership hid the fact that they were using teachers’ regular dues to fund Spiller’s run.  As a result, very few, if any, teachers knew their mandatory, annual dues were funding Spiller. To this day, NJEA leadership has never acknowledged to teachers that their regular dues were funding Spiller’s run in any of the NJEA’s main interfaces with teachers: the NJEA’s website, the monthly magazine for teachers, NJEA Review, and the NJEA’s Facebook page.  The fact is that Spiller has been the most non-transparent candidate, and his “#ShowUsTheMoney” gimmick is just more stunning hypocrisy.

Cutting through Spiller’s hypocritical posturing, the facts show that he is an extremely weak candidate. Noted journalist Matt Yglesias accurately described his run for governor a “weird Spiller ego trip.”  Yet New Jersey teachers will be forced to spend $40 million of their hard-earned dues on Spiller’s vanity run. They have no choice.  It’s a scandal of the first order.