Keith Hovey

NJ for Obama organizers, from left: Peter Brown, Julie Diaz, and Keith Hovey.: Politicker photo 

DENVER - They were a scrappy, grassroots group of no-name organizers when Peter Brown and Julie Diaz sat in a diner bull-dozed up to the side of a Jersey highway months ago.

But anti-establishment candidate Sen. Barack Obama’s (D-Il) victory in the Democratic presidential Primary propelled them, and NJ for Obama director Keith Hovey, into the laps of New Jersey’s political establishment tonight as the three of them attended a dinner at the Inverness Hotel hosted by Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and U.S. Rep. Steve Rothman (D-Fair Lawn).

"I’m just happy to be here, I don’t care if I have to sit behind Guam," said Hovey.

Obama Campaign State Director Mark Alexander. 

The campaign was about to change.

On Oct, 9, 2007, an announcement came down from Chicago regarding New Jersey operations. 

Mark Alexander, a Seton Hall University law professor and Obama’s senior policy advisor, would be the campaign’s official state director.

"I am grateful that he is going to carry the fight forward to and through the Feb. 5 contests," Obama said of Alexander. "He is a valued and trusted advisor, and at the same time has deep ties in his home of New Jersey that will be invaluable to our efforts. 

"I am proud of the policy work we have done on this campaign and through Mark’s leadership we have built a team of key advisors from the ground up that will continue to offer new and innovative approaches to the challenges this country faces," added the presidential candidate.

A personal friend of Barack and Michelle Obama’s going back a dozen years, Alexander as a child worked on the 1974 Washington, D.C. mayoral campaign of his father, Clifford Alexander, former chairman of the Equal Opportunity Commission. Later, he ran Sen. Bill Bradley’s 2000 presidential campaign and served as counsel to Cory Booker.