Shirley Emehelu, a former federal prosecutor who has served as New Jersey’s Acting Secretary of State since September, is the pick to replace Dale Caldwell as Lt. Governor.
Gov. Mikie Sherrill will make the formal announcement today, the final day she had to name a successor to Caldwell, who resigned Sept. 25. News of the appointment was first reported by the New Jersey Globe.
Emehelu does not need to be confirmed by the Legislature.
Emehelu is all but certain to keep the Secretary of State post. Sherrill named her Acting Secretary of State on Sept. 25, the day Caldwell, who held both posts, resigned. By law, the Lt. Governor must also lead a cabinet-level department, and keeping her at State avoids a domino of changes elsewhere in the administration.
Emehelu was chosen over Assemblywoman Verlina Reynolds-Jackson (D-Trenton).
The choice may carry even more weight down the road.
Sherrill is widely seen as a potential pick for a top post in a Democratic presidential administration (including vice president), should a Democrat win the White House in 2028.
Whether that happens, and whether Sherrill would want such a job, is pure speculation. But New Jersey elects its governor a year after the presidential election. If Sherrill were to leave for Washington, the Lt. Governor would serve as governor for the rest of her term.
Emehelu has spent the past several years in some of the state’s most senior legal and oversight jobs. She has served as:
• Acting Secretary of State, since Sept. 25;
• Acting State Comptroller;
• Executive Assistant Attorney General, the third-ranking official in the Attorney General’s Office, for two years.
In the Attorney General’s Office, she directly counseled the Attorney General, coordinated oversight of the more than 500 attorneys in the Division of Law, the state’s largest legal office, and directed civil defense and enforcement matters covering environmental protection, civil rights, consumer and labor protection, firearms safety and data privacy.
Before joining state government, Emehelu was a Member of the White Collar Criminal Defense and Government Investigations Group at Chiesa Shahinian & Giantomasi, where she co-led the firm’s Banking and Finance Group.
She spent nine years at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey, where she prosecuted complex financial fraud cases and served as Chief of Asset Recovery and Anti-Money Laundering, overseeing statewide programs in federal asset forfeiture, money laundering and victim restitution.
She clerked for U.S. District Judge James R. Spencer in the Eastern District of Virginia, and holds a bachelor’s degree from Yale University and a law degree from Yale Law School.
The Lt. Governor’s post was established in 2006 and first filled when Kim Guadagno served under Chris Christie, starting in January 2010. Sheila Oliver and Tahesha Way served in the post under Gov. Phil Murphy. Emehelu would be the fifth person to hold the job.
