Former New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey, who resigned in scandal, seeks a comeback as mayor

Former New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey took a formal step Tuesday toward mounting a political comeback two decades after he resigned from the state’s highest office in a sex scandal that captivated the nation.

McGreevey, a Democrat, filed a form with the state Election Law Enforcement Commission indicating he is running for mayor of Jersey City in 2025. It names a treasurer and creates a candidate committee, “Jim McGreevey for mayor.”

The city's current mayor, Steven Fulop, is not seeking reelection and is instead running in 2025 for governor, McGreevey's old job. Other mayoral contenders are reportedly expected, so McGreevey is by no means a shoo-in despite his local connections and name recognition.

McGreevey, 66, answered a call from POLITICO about the filing but said he could not immediately speak.

It is highly unusual for a former governor to seek lower office after they’ve left the statehouse. For McGreevey, it would be a return to his roots on two fronts. He served as mayor of Woodbridge from 1991 to 2002 while simultaneously holding office in the state Assembly and Senate. He is also a native of Jersey City and in recent years reestablished himself in the state's second-largest municipality running a statewide prison reentry program.

“Being governor is so much about the budget, the dollar,” he told the New York Times last month. “Being mayor is about building strong communities.”

McGreevey was elected governor in 2001 and took office in 2002.

His two-year stint included some notable policy achievements, including a massive school construction program; overhauling New Jersey's car insurance industry, a move which saved motorists money; and closing what was at the time the country's largest budget deficit without raising the state's sales or income tax.

But McGreevey is most well-known for his stunning resignation and admission that he is "a gay American" in 2004, a decade before same-sex marriage was legalized.

His downfall had been precipitated by a slow-burning scandal involving Golan Cipel, an Israeli citizen. McGreevey had hired Cipel in 2002 as a homeland security adviser despite lacking qualifications and being unable to get a federal security clearance. The hiring raised questions about the relationship between the two, but McGreevey denied an affair.

McGreevey and Cipel continued to carry out a secret relationship until it soured. In July 2004, lawyers for Cipel threatened to sue McGreevey for sexual harassment. McGreevey claims he was extorted, but nonetheless he faced a reckoning. That August, he admitted to an extramarital affair and resigned in a speech that’s become part of American lore.

“At a point in every person's life, one has to look deeply into the mirror of one's soul and decide one's unique truth in the world, not as we may want to see it or hope to see it, but as it is,” he said. “And so my truth is that I am a gay American."

McGreevey trained to become a priest after leaving office, wrote a memoir and was the subject of an HBO documentary by Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi’s daughter Alexandra Pelosi.

He’d decided to quit politics for good, but in recent months has reportedly been encouraged to run for mayor. His filing Tuesday seems to be the beginning of his next chapter in New Jersey politics.