Sen. Nicholas Scutari speaks in favor of Bill S4924 at the New Jersey State House, Trenton, NJ, Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. (Photo by Anne-Marie Caruso/New Jersey Monitor)
A New Jersey Senate panel unanimously approved legislation Monday that would strip some investigatory powers and staff from the state’s comptroller over overwhelming opposition from activists, other watchdogs, and New Jersey’s chief law enforcement official.
Over nearly four hours of testimony in front of the Senate state government committee that included several shouting matches, a range of critics urged lawmakers not to advance legislation that would end the Office of the State Comptroller’s ability to issue subpoenas and launch investigations into waste, fraud, and abuse.
Senate President Nicholas Scutari (D-Union), the bill’s chief sponsor, defended the measure at the start of the hearing and said criticism of it is overblown.
“This is a reallocation of small resources from one department to another which is more properly equipped to handle them,” Scutari said.
The bill would remove powers and duties the comptroller inherited from the state’s defunct inspector general’s office in 2010.
The proposed shift would eliminate the office’s duty to investigate complaints of governmental waste, fraud, and abuse flagged by members of the public and strip the comptroller of some investigatory tools.
The comptroller’s office would keep its authority to audit state and local governments and the state’s Medicaid program, though the bill would make it harder for it to obtain documents to aid those audits.
Though state law requires governments to share documents with the comptroller at the office’s request, the office has said some bodies — including joint health insurance funds with ties to South Jersey Democratic power broker George Norcross — have declined to turn over records.
The bill would shift the comptroller’s lost powers to the State Commission of Investigation, a body originally convened in 1968 to combat organized crime that has grown less relevant and less productive as New Jersey’s mobs weakened.
Bruce Keller, who was appointed as the commission’s executive director in July, argued during Monday’s hearing that his agency is better positioned to conduct investigations now overseen by the comptroller’s office.
“Investigations is 100% of the SCI’s work, and the SCI does it with former prosecutors and deeply experienced state and federally trained investigators, and we’re adding even more in the months ahead,” he said.
The legislation would grant the State Commission of Investigation an expanded mandate, allowing it to investigate misuses of taxpayer money as the comptroller does now. The bill would also allow it to investigate misconduct by law enforcement.
The latter provision, combined with another allowing the commission to seek approval for wiretaps, pushed New Jersey’s top law enforcement official to sound the alarm.
“The idea of wiretapping conducted by a civil enforcement agency never once came up to me, in my four years as an attorney general, as an idea we should even consider, much less one I should be testifying about before this body,” said Attorney General Matt Platkin.
Platkin added that he has significant concerns about the bill’s constitutionality, warning the provisions that would allow staff at the State Commission of Investigation — an agency overseen partly by the Legislature — to seek wiretaps or participate in prosecutions risk trampling on the separation of powers by allowing the Legislature to enforce laws, rather than draft them.
“What it does is it creates a rogue prosecution agency reportable to legislative leadership with an executive director — as great as Bruce Keller may be — the Legislature reaffirms can be fired at will with no notice,” said Platkin.
Attorney General Matt Platkin, Sen. Andy Kim and Acting Comptroller Kevin Walsh speak against Bill S4924, at the New Jersey State House, Trenton, NJ, Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. (Photo by Anne-Marie Caruso/New Jersey Monitor)Few who testified Monday said they oppose making the State Commission of Investigation more robust, though almost universally, witnesses said changes should not come at the expense of the comptroller’s office.
Acting State Comptroller Kevin Walsh said his office is more productive, noting it had published 25 reports in 2025 to the commission’s zero.
“The reality is SCI can return to its glory days, and Mr. Keller may even be the one to do it, but it doesn’t need to come at the cost of undermining the executive branch’s watchdog when we have been more effective, more prolific, including in investigations,” Walsh said.
The comptroller’s falling out with legislators began in 2023 after the office released a report that Union County had improperly paid some of its top officials, and that conflict heated to a boiling point over the following two years.
Subsequent reports that found waste in Essex County’s COVID-19 vaccine program and procurement violations in Hudson County spurred calls from county officials to rein in the office with legislative hearings.
Some witnesses — including some of the state’s other oversight officials — suggested the bill is retaliation over the comptroller’s work.
“While it has been presented as if it were not an attack on one agency, it does appear to be an attack on one agency — not because it’s doing a bad job, but quite a good job, I think,” said Terry Schuster, New Jersey’s corrections ombudsman. “Independent oversight bodies have to be able to say the truth, even when it’s unpopular.”
State Sen. John Burzichelli (D-Burlington) said the bill was drafted because of dissatisfaction “with how things have been running” at the comptroller’s office, though neither he nor any other members of the committee named particular problems there.
Sen. Jim Beach (D-Camden), the committee’s chair, suggested the bill was spurred by discontent with Platkin’s performance as attorney general, though the bill does not affect Platkin’s office outside of allowing the commission to seek wiretap approval for employees of the Office of the Attorney General.
Sen. James Beach asks a question of Sen. Andy Kim who testifies against Bill S4924 at the State House, Trenton, NJ, Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. (Photo by Anne-Marie Caruso/New Jersey Monitor) Beach, who chairs the Camden County Democratic Committee and is a close Norcross ally, imposed a strict three-minute time limit on testimony by most of the bill’s roughly three dozen opponents — including, at times, by cutting their microphones — but not its supporters.
Beach engaged in shouting matches with Walsh and also with U.S. Sen Andy Kim (D-NJ), who was among those to testify against the bill. Kim had asked to testify at the start of the hearing, but Beach would not allow him to speak until near the end, even when some witnesses whose names were called earlier said they would cede their time to Kim.
When Kim’s testimony surpassed the three-minute mark, Beach told him he had to conclude.
“Sir, I have been here for five-and-a-half hours,” Kim told Beach.
“Yeah, so what?” Beach responded. “So has everyone else. Why do you think you’re special? You’re not.”
