Tim Alexander, a retired law enforcement officer, former prosecutor, and civil rights attorney, has spent decades advocating for justice, community service, and policy reform. From his early experiences as a victim of police misconduct to leading criminal investigations and rewriting law enforcement policies, Alexander has been driven by a commitment to protect citizens’ rights and improve the lives of those in South Jersey. Now, as a candidate for Congress in New Jersey’s Second Congressional District, he brings his personal experiences, professional expertise, and passion for community advocacy to the forefront of his campaign, emphasizing healthcare access, job creation, and equitable resources for the region.
In an exclusive interview with the nation’s premier faith-based and professional newspaper for winners, Anointed News Journal, Tim Alexander shares his vision to deliver real solutions, advocate for the underserved, and fight for leadership that truly represents the people of South Jersey.
Collins:
Who is Tim Alexander?
Alexander:
Well, that’s a big question. So let me start with what’s important to me. I have been married for 38 years to a wonderful woman named Anna. We have three beautiful adult children who are doing well in life, and we have a brand-new grandbaby who just turned one, so we’re super excited about that. Those are the things that really shape who I am.
I am a retired law enforcement officer after 27 years of service. I then went on to become a prosecutor for the City of Philadelphia as an Assistant District Attorney. After that, I decided to pursue civil rights litigation. The reason I was motivated to go in that direction is because, before I was in law enforcement, I was a victim of police violence. My rights were violated by three undercover officers in the City of Newark, and then they charged me with a crime I did not commit. I had to go through the system to clear my name.
I’ll never forget when we were in court waiting to testify at the grand jury. My grandfather said to me, “Hold your head up.” I said, “Well, my head is up.” He said, “No, your head is not up. You need to hold your head up. And if you’re upset about what happened to you, you need to do something about it.”
I said, “Well, I am going to do something about it. I’m going to sue them. I’m going to do this and that.” And he said, “No. You want to be a police officer. I want you to go on to be a police officer, because the best way to make change is from within.”
That resonated with me enough that I continued my pursuit of a career in law enforcement. I ultimately retired as a Captain of Detectives, in charge of the Criminal Investigation Section for the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office. I was shaped by that experience and remained dedicated to ensuring people’s rights were protected as we did our job.
At one point in my career, I was a lieutenant responsible for writing policy. I was rewriting policies for both the agency and the county law enforcement community as a whole when it dawned on me—this is what my grandfather was talking about. Now I could make the changes I believed needed to be made. And I did just that, and was very successful at it.
Collins:
So today, you are also a candidate for United States Congress in the Second Congressional District. What was your motivation to run for Congress?
Alexander:
It was the same motivation I had before. I saw what was happening — with the election of Joe Biden and the January 6th riots. I had been contemplating running for office because I always believed I could do good from the inside, following my grandfather’s wisdom.
Congress came into focus because, in our district (CD2), we had a good candidate who ran in 2020 and was not successful. They actually outraised and outspent the incumbent yet still could not overcome the apathy of people who did not show up to vote.
At the same time, my daughter was gravely ill. She was a police officer with Camden Metro. She became involved in a domestic violence situation, and after it was resolved, she realized she had been rolling around in absolute filth — human fecal matter and everything else. Initially, it didn’t seem like a major consequence, and she simply had to change her uniform. But two days later, she contracted a virus doctors could not identify. The virus eventually ran its course, but it affected her heart. She was in ICU because the enzymes indicating a heart attack kept rising — and she was only 31 years old.
Fast-forwarding, at age 33 she had to undergo a heart transplant. During her hospitalization, which was during COVID, we could not even speak to her. She was sedated through most of the end of the year and began waking up around the first of the year.
On January 6th, the first call I received from her was, “Are you seeing what’s going on in Washington?” And with that, I said, okay — I have to get involved. I cannot sit on the sideline. Let me see what I can do.
So I started looking at what our district needed — how we could improve life for people here. I discovered that we had the three poorest counties in New Jersey, and I saw that our current representative had done nothing about that when he was a Democrat, and nothing after he switched to Republican. So I started mapping out what we could get done — how to create jobs, make life more affordable — and I went item by item. Then I went and found the resources to pay for it, because people cannot afford another tax.
Once all that was put together, I launched my campaign. I won the Democratic primary but lost the general election to the incumbent.
Two years later, I decided to run again — still campaigning to create jobs, make life more affordable, and using the same funding models, plus a new one aimed directly at public school education and helping reduce property taxes in New Jersey. I developed that platform as well.
Unfortunately, someone came in from outside the district with a pocket full of cash. He outspent me in the primary and won by just over 400 votes. After that, I was resolved that this wasn’t meant to be, and I wasn’t going to run again. I went about my life.
Then the next election came up — the one we’re in now. I was asked by several people if I would run, and I politely declined. It wasn’t until they passed this one big — what I call the BS bill.
Collins:
Before you get into the BS bill, let me ask you a question. When you lost the second election by 400-plus votes, was there anything that took you back to your grandfather’s words? What was that like? What was going on in your head at that time?
Alexander:
It’s great you bring that up, because when I lost, I was angry about some of the circumstances in the election. First and foremost, I believe in owning my errors. This was my loss. Could I blame what I perceived as political maneuvering from those opposed to me in the Democratic Party? Yes, I could. But the bottom line is I lost the election, and I was done with it.
Still, there was this thought in the back of my mind — are you really done? Is this the right decision? Should you try for a different office? I had said I was done in 2024 and 2026, but I was thinking maybe I would try again in 2027 with a state run.
I am always mindful that you cannot make as much change from the outside as you can from the inside. Those are my grandfather’s words. That kept the pilot light burning. At that time, it was lit, but there was no flame.
Collins:
Did you feel you failed yourself or missed an opportunity to create change? What was going through your mind?
Alexander:
With respect to losing this race, it wasn’t about bruised ego. It was, how many people did we let down? How many people who came out, post carded, wrote letters, knocked on doors, and did everything we needed done — did we let down? That was the hardest part.
That was also what made it difficult for me to walk away clean. I’m indebted to so many people, tens of thousands. It is hard to fully walk away and not try to do something else. I felt it would be shameful.
I just didn’t want to try for the congressional seat anymore because I was upset about the way things worked out and some of the shenanigans that occurred. But what reignited the fire higher than ever was the fact that this one big “BS bill” would have made my daughter’s surgery either financially crippling or not possible at all.
Collins:
For context, we are talking about the legislation, the bill the President passed, the “big ugly bill”. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people across the country are losing their health care, losing their SNAP benefits, losing their jobs. What was it about this bill that motivated you to get back in and try one more time?
Alexander:
You summed it up well, but here is how it affected me personally. As I just explained, my daughter had to have heart surgery. She was living independently; she had a mortgage, a car payment, and she was a happy 31-year-old enjoying life. Then this situation completely crippled her.
My wife and I were able to help with her bills, her mortgage, and her car payment. But what we could not cover was her health insurance. So my wife moved her onto Medicaid, because once you are out as a police officer for a year, you must resign or be terminated. You cannot be off the job longer than that. She was out due to her heart condition for over a year, and she had to resign. So, she went on Medicaid.
She was in New Jersey on Medicaid, and we were not happy with the facility or the speed at which they were moving, given how critical her condition was. So, we had her transferred to Penn in Philadelphia, and we were relieved because they immediately went to work, moving things forward, and making progress. Eventually they determined she was eligible, and we met with different teams to understand her recovery and needs.
But the last person we met with was the financial representative, who said, “Your daughter lives in New Jersey. She is having this procedure in Pennsylvania. New Jersey is not going to cover it. How are you going to pay for this bill?” The procedure alone was $2.7 million.
My wife and I were up all night. We made a list of our assets, what we could sell, how we would live, where we would live; We were prepared to sell the house and do everything possible to pay as much as we could. We were prepared to take on the rest because there was no way I was going to have a 33-year-old with a new heart face catastrophic medical debt of that magnitude, not to mention the related expenses of almost another month in the hospital.
The next morning, my wife got on the phone. She found a loophole in Medicaid that allowed her surgery to be done in Pennsylvania because the closest qualifying facility in New Jersey was more than 35 miles from her home. It worked, and Medicaid paid the bill.
Today, my daughter is an RN for the Jefferson Health Care system. We have a happy ending… but the problem is this: with this “one big, beautiful bill,” as they call it, that loophole is now closed.
Now, if my daughter were in that same situation today and was on Medicaid, she would have two choices: medical bankruptcy or death. That is what our kids are facing right now, beginning January 2026. But the bottom line is this: no child, young adult, or senior should have to choose between going bankrupt because they cannot afford the bill or refusing surgery and dying.
That was the moment that pushed me over the top. I knew I had to get in and fight these policies and executive orders. We need to get smart, get motivated, and have someone who will push as hard as possible, take the risks, and not shy away from the consequences.
I am not a career politician. When I get in there, I am going to raise all the noise I can. If it costs me the next election because someone wants to primary me, so be it… it will not change my life much. I am going to do what I can to help the people of this district, and I will do it until I can look at CD2 and say it no longer contains the three poorest counties in New Jersey. I want to see dramatic improvement, and I want that distinction to belong somewhere else.
We need low unemployment, not higher unemployment than the rest of the state. We need infrastructure, not a system where you cannot catch a bus on a reasonable schedule no matter where you live. There are resources that must be brought to this part of the state. When resources reach New Jersey, they tend to go north — we do not get our fair share. Yet we pay the same taxes as everyone else. We do not get a discount for being left behind. All of this has to change. We must get smarter and bolder.
That is my motivation. This one big bill was the catalyst that started everything. Quite honestly, I am going to fight relentlessly to win this race because we cannot afford another day with Jeff Van Drew as our congressperson.
That is what I remind myself of every day when I get discouraged — whether it’s fundraising or hearing something about an opponent making inroads here or there. I go right back to it: this race is too important. It was the same mantra I had when I suspended my campaign to help Mikie Sherrill win, particularly in South Jersey. My goal was that if we could win South Jersey (and knowing she would win North Jersey) she would win overall. As a result, she won four of our six counties.
To me, that mattered. We flipped Atlantic from red to blue. We flipped Cumberland from red to blue. Gloucester was already blue, but now it is stronger. Cape May went from red to purple. Ocean stayed red — I have 12, 13, maybe 17 towns there and we have around the same number, slightly fewer, in Gloucester. Salem stayed red, but Ocean saw a bigger turnout than in the past.
Salem needs work. It needs people to understand there is a better option. That is what we are focusing on. We have a lot of data from helping that campaign. We know where we need to be and how to motivate voters. People can be motivated if you give them the right information and the right amount of hope, because it can be done.
Collins:
So helping out with Sherrill’s campaign, you feel it gave you new strategy. What would be different in this campaign compared to the past?
Alexander:
Well, we have to demonstrate that we have a pathway to victory — and now we can. We can show the inroads we made in Atlantic, Cumberland, and Cape May counties. We can show what needs to happen in Salem to bring them on board. Gloucester has a lot of strength. Ocean County gave us a great turnout. I only need to secure the southern tip.
And I’ll tell you, they are highly motivated, but we still have work to do. We know the communities we must be in. We know how people voted for Sherrill versus Van Drew, and we need to focus on the areas where we weren’t strong. We can’t leave anybody behind. We cannot say, “If we just win this area, we win.” We have to win it all, and we have to send a strong message to the Republican Party that the MAGA wing is done. It needs to be buried and sent to some other universe.
Bottom line: people here have had enough. What they want is progress. We now have the data to tell us where we need to be and which communities we must engage in order to make that happen.
Collins:
Alright, Tim, let me ask you a big question. Your family has experienced some difficult times, yet you’ve overcome them together. How does your family feel about you going one more round?
Alexander:
You know, when I initially said I wasn’t going to run again, my family was in complete agreement. No one said, “Dad, you’ve got to try one more time.” There was none of that. But when that bill passed, we had a family meeting before I made the decision. I read aloud the section about dramatically cutting Medicaid and eventually Medicare, in November 2026. My wife practically finished the sentence for me. She said, “You have the base. You have the infrastructure. People know your name. You’ve got to run again.”
After that, we met with the rest of the family. Once I explained the motivation — exactly the way I shared it with you — they were all in. And they weren’t just supportive in words; they’re working with us. My daughters show up at events when I can’t. My son comes up from D.C. and helps wherever he can, including technical backend work and data analysis. This campaign is a team effort, and the core of that team is my family.
They understand why I’m doing this. They understand why it must be done, and they understand the urgency. My first campaign slogan was “The urgency of now.” Today it has evolved to “Leadership equals solutions.”
Because the reality is we don’t have adequate leadership, especially from Jeff Van Drew… and we desperately need it. I said the same thing during the gubernatorial race: “We cannot afford to lose.” If Jack Ciattarelli had become governor of New Jersey, we would have built an entirely new wing for Donald Trump; New Jersey would become his secondary base. That message resonated, people understood the urgency, and it worked.
The same principle holds true now. We cannot afford to lose this race to Jeff Van Drew. With all the chaos the Republicans are pushing, he voted for it every single time. If we don’t defeat him, he’ll be there forever. And that cannot happen, because he is not working in our interest.
Look at the counties we flipped; they were red, but they were also the poorest counties. Republicans continue to run them, and I called them out on it. I was invited onto some right-wing radio show as a pundit, and I pointed out that the three poorest counties in New Jersey have been under Republican control for decades. I asked, “How is that possible? What is your party doing?” They lost their minds, but no one answered the question, because they can’t. The party serves itself, not the people.
We Democrats will demonstrate that we are the ones committed to representing people, to making government work. Are we perfect? Absolutely not. Do we need accountability? You bet we do. And we’re going to deliver that from within. I will be the loudest voice you can imagine when we mess up, because we must own our mistakes, correct them, and make sure we apologize to the people we serve.
Collins:
Now, Tim, as you know from rounds one and two, campaigning takes significant resources. How can the general public participate and contribute to your campaign?
Alexander:
I need everyone reading this article to go to TimAlexander4Congress.com. Look at whatever interests you: my background, our promotional videos; but then click that donate button and give what you can. You can contribute up to $3,500 per election cycle — that’s $3,500 for the primary and another $3,500 for the general. We need as much support as possible to get our message to people who aren’t already engaged in politics.
Collins:
And just to be clear for the public — you can donate up to $3,500 per cycle. But if someone wants to give $5 or $10 or any amount, that’s okay too.
Alexander:
Absolutely, they can give $5. One hundred percent. That’s the heart of a grassroots campaign. Yes, we appreciate the larger donations, the “money that folds,” as people say, but the $5, $10, and $25 contributions are what truly move the needle. People reading this are likely already paying attention to politics. But we need to reach the households that don’t pick up a newspaper, don’t go online beyond Facebook, and don’t watch the news. We need to reach them and say: This is who I am. This is why I’m running. This is why I need your vote. And that happens when those who are engaged chip in and help us do the work.
So that’s TimAlexander4Congress.com. Also, please follow our campaign on social media: Tim Alexander for Congress: A Voice for South Jersey. Like the page and invite your friends. The more people added to that network, the further our message reaches when we run ads. We need that audience to be as large as possible.
Collins:
And what about people who want to donate their time?
Alexander:
Yes, when you go to TimAlexander4Congress.com, you can sign up as a volunteer. My wife Anna is our volunteer coordinator and she does an incredible job identifying people’s strengths and plugging them into the campaign. Not everyone can knock on doors, and that’s okay. We’ll find a role for you, wherever you are. Your time has value, and it truly makes an impact.
Learn more
But let me be candid… right now, it is largely about raising money. We have to demonstrate viability — that people believe in our pathway to victory. When people research the race, they see for themselves that I am the only candidate with the name recognition, infrastructure, and support system capable of beating Jeff Van Drew in November. That’s not arrogance, it’s fact.
I didn’t lose previous races because people disliked my message. I lost because not enough people heard it. The people who did hear me voted for me. So we must expand our reach.
There is no obstacle we can’t overcome. President Obama won this district twice and I know I can win it too, as an African American male. We need to do this now. We need to send MAGA packing out of New Jersey. And once we do, we’ll start seeing down-ballot races flipping and finally see real change and progress.
Collins:
Tim, what do you say to people who may not live in your district but have family members who do?
Alexander:
That’s a great question, because you don’t have to live in this district to support us. In fact, you don’t need to have family here to get involved. If you like what I’m saying, if you like what you see on our Facebook page or website, then support us — sign up and help.
We had volunteers last cycle from as far away as California. They were able to make calls and do work during hours when people here in New Jersey were done for the night. And seeing postcards arrive from towns in California meant a lot. It shows that people around the country are paying attention to this race and saying, “This is the next one we win.”
We came close in Louisiana last night, and that has to rattle the GOP. I want to do it here. But not just come close — I want to win. This absolutely has to be a win, and we need to send that message to the MAGA GOP.
Collins:
When is the election?
Alexander:
That’s correct. Our primary is June 2nd, 2026. And yes, removing Jeff Van Drew is the focus, but my immediate objective is winning the primary. I must win the primary to defeat Jeff. Losing it is not an option, because we’ve seen repeatedly that no matter how much money someone has, if people don’t know you in this district, they will not vote for you.
We’ve proven that over and over again. Even when I wasn’t considering another run, I never stopped serving the community. I continued activism, attended events across the district, stayed engaged, and used my background as a civil rights attorney to take on pro bono cases for people who otherwise couldn’t afford help.
And that wasn’t because I was planning to run again — I was clear that I had no intention of doing so. It was because our community desperately needs this kind of attention. I can do a lot more in-office than I can outside of it, and we have already done a great deal outside. So imagine the impact once we’re in.
Right now, we have someone who shows up to cut ribbons or pin badges on Boy Scouts. That doesn’t move the needle. It makes people feel good for about five minutes, and that’s it. Constituent services are the lowest bar of a congressional office. Everyone has good constituent services because they hire staff for it. That’s not a reason to support someone who isn’t moving the whole community forward.
And that’s the message we need shared. Everyone who reads this article — I hope you spread the word that we need real leadership and real solutions. We don’t get that by repeating the same old, same old.
Collins:
The Anointed News Journal has over 180,000 readers. In conclusion, what do you want to say to the readers of The Anointed?
Alexander:
I pray that everyone who reads this article will lend their support, both financially and in other ways. Just imagine if all 180,000 subscribers donated $5, it would make a huge impact on our fundraising. That alone is incredible.
We know not everyone can afford even $5, so we need others to give what they can to support those who aren’t able to contribute. What’s most important is that people get involved, have the fire and will to make this happen. We need to stand united and support the campaign financially. And if you live in the district, show up and vote. The vote is worth a million dollars. Those are the two most important messages I hope readers take away.
Collins:
And outside of the website, is there a contact number or other ways people can reach your campaign?
Alexander:
Yes. You can always call our campaign at (609) 982-8389. If you prefer not to use technology, you can also write us a check or a letter. Our mailing address is: P.O. Box 818, Oceanville, New Jersey 08231.
We love to hear from people, so please leave a message and we will get back to you. The strength and engagement South Jersey showed for Mikie Sherrill and Dale Caldwell gives me hope that CD2 can rally just as strongly for Tim Alexander.
Conclusion:
Tim Alexander’s journey from law enforcement and civil rights advocacy to congressional candidate reflects his enduring commitment to justice, community, and leadership that delivers results. Motivated by personal experiences and the urgent needs of South Jersey, he emphasizes healthcare access, job creation, and equitable resources across the board; that is what he is striving for to make a reality. As he engages voters, Alexander seeks to inspire action. He encourages residents and supporters alike to unite, participate, and ensure meaningful change for the district.
Visit www.timalexander4congress.com to support and get involved.
By Chris Collins
