January 15, 2026
Tiffany Burress, Wife Of Ex-NFL Player, Wants To ‘Try Something Different’ With GOP Bid For NJ’s Congressional Seat
Despite being her first run in politics, Burress has already received support from some of the state’s top GOP members, calling her the "candidate who can win."
Tiffany Burress, the wife of former New York Giants star Plaxico Burress, is hoping to “try something different” for northern New Jersey constituents by running for a New Jersey Congressional seat as a Republican.
In her campaign video, posted on X, Burress highlights her career in the public sector as a lawyer who fights for workers and claims Democratic opponent Nellie Pou does what she is told since she was “given” most of the accomplishments of her career. “Doors didn’t just open for me, I busted through them, becoming a successful lawyer, wife, and mother of two,” she said.
“When my party is wrong, I’ll say it and bust down doors to fix it. You won’t get that from Nellie and 50 years of partisan politics.”
Burress criticized Pou for being handed the seat of the Garden State’s 9th District without a race in 2024 after Bill Pascrell Jr., who once held the seat, passed away.
Her race entrance could be considered intriguing, since the district, including East Rutherford, where the Giants’ MetLife Stadium complex is located, hasn’t had Republican leadership since Rep. Harold Hollenbeck’s re-election in 1981, according to Fox News. Instead, the area favored Democratic leadership, such as Robert “The Torch” Torricelli, serving from 1983 to 1997, and Pascrell.
The region also sided with the recent winner of Jersey’s governor race, Democrat Mikie Sherrill.
However, Burress has already received support from some of the state’s top GOP members, including Passaic GOP Chair Peter Murphy, Bergen GOP Chair Jack DeLorenzo, and Hudson GOP Chair Jose Arango. In a joint statement, the leaders said, “Tiffany Burress is the candidate who can win this district,” despite this being the first political campaign for the former NFL WAG.
“With her experience, leadership, and connections in our shared communities, Tiffany has what it takes to bring fresh, accountable representation to North Jersey,” said Arango.
But not all Republican leaders are feeling the mom of two. A spokesperson for Rosie Pino, who is also running for the hot-ticketed district seat in the same party, compared a vote for Burress to a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the leg, perhaps alluding to Burress’s husband’s gun mishap in 2008. “Supporting an unknown, untested, out-of-touch candidate who does not reside in the district and changed her party affiliation a few weeks ago just to run for office, would be the political equivalent of shooting ourselves in the leg — dividing the Republican Party and forfeiting the opportunity to hold the critical House Majority,” spokesperson Kennith Gonzalez said.
Seems like the two candidates share switch-ups in common as Pino’s website boldly states she “left the Democratic Party and became a Republican.”