It's still early in 2021, but there's a gubernatorial election this year in New Jersey and Democratic Governor Phil Murphy will run for reelection. His likely Republican opponent will be former Assemblymember Jack Ciattarelli.

While New Jersey residents continue to give Murphy high marks for his leadership during the pandemic, Ciattarelli and other state Republicans want to flag the fact that the state has the highest per-capita nursing home death rate in the country, and want to make that a defining issue of the campaign. The likely Republican nominee highlighted it in his first campaign ad, which began airing last week.

"Scared and alone: That's how 8,000 seniors and veterans died in our nursing homes during the pandemic," Ciattarelli says, as he faces the camera. "They died because Gov. Murphy ordered nursing homes to take in COVID-19 patients."

Star-Ledger and NJ Advance Media reporter Susan Livio has been covering nursing homes in New Jersey during the pandemic. She said while the Murphy administration made its COVID guidelines clear to nursing home operators last March, the state might not have followed through on enforcement.

"Given what was at stake, the state should have been a bit more aggressive in making sure that these orders were followed," Livio told WNYC's Michael Hill.