Included in the suit and also named personally is Jersey City Council President L. Harvey Smith who ran against Cunningham for the 31St Legislative District Council seat and lost ignominiously. Smith is the only African American named in the complaints. If the NAACP prevails, Smith could find himself sanctioned by the NAACP for racially discriminating against other African Americans.

The NAACP suit personally names HCDO candidates Joe Doria, Elba Perez Cinciarelli, and L. Harvey Smith, all of whom lost to Cunningham and successful running mates Assemblymen Louis Manzo and Anthony Chiappone. Doria and Cinciarelli were incumbents and still lost. Doria had 24 years in the Assembly. Recently Doria was awarded a $70,000 a year County contract to lobby the Assembly on behalf of the County of Hudson as he is no longer a member of the Assembly. Party head Congressman Bob Menendez, D-13, ranking Democrat in Hudson County reportedly told Doria "You might not have lost if you had gotten off your fat ass and campaigned."

The suit also names individually County Chief of Staff William A. Gaughan. Gaughan is also a Jersey City Council member and leader of the HCDO council opposition to Cunningham's administration. Also named is County Clerk Javier Inclan. Inclan was recently appointed to the post of County Clerk after the death of Janet Haynes. At the time of the primary, Inclan was executive director of the HCDO and instrumental in the campaign. The suit charges Inclan with issuing instructions to HCDO vote challengers after the primary to proceed with their challenges in a discriminatory fashion.

The HCDO appointment of Inclan to the post also caused a great deal of dissatisfaction in the African American community here since Inclan is Hispanic and is replacing an African American – representing the loss of an African American job.

Doria, still Mayor of Bayonne, made no campaign appearances in Jersey City during the primary and Jersey City is two thirds of the 31st Legislative District. The closest Doria came was an in person appearance at a park that straddles the border between Bayonne and Jersey City's Greenville neighborhood that is also the Ward F targeted in complaints by NAACP. Doria made his one appearance in that park when New Jersey Governor James McGreevey came in his only appearance in the area to endorse the HCDO candidates running against Cunningham and his slate. Cunningham endorsed and supported McGreevey when McGreevey ran for Governor.

NAACP attorneys said that statistics clearly show that after the primary the challenges to votes by HCDO members targeted African American voters almost exclusively and not a single Bayonne resident. Bayonne is just 5 percent African American. Jersey City's Ward F, where the HCDO voter challenge centered, is 80 percent African American. 

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