By james art 
Former New Jersey Assembly Speaker Garabed “Chuck” Haytayan, one of the leading figures of the Republican wave that swept Trenton in the 1990s and an influential lawmaker for more than two decades, has died at age 86, state officials said on Friday.
The cause of death is unclear, although Khaitayan reportedly had health problems in recent months, officials said.
A lawmaker from the northwest corner of the state, Khaitayan was both affable and outspoken, loyal to his party and sometimes belligerent with the press — something of a precursor to some modern politicians.
Haytaian — pronounced Hi-TIE-an — took the top job in the lower house of the state Legislature in 1992 when Republicans took control of both chambers in a voter revolt against Democratic Gov. Jim Florio’s $2.8 billion in tax increases . Republican Christy Whitman unseated Florio in the next gubernatorial election.
Khaitayan later ran for the US Senate in 1994 when he unsuccessfully tried to unseat Democratic Senator Frank Lautenberg, falling by just 3 percentage points. Khaitayan then served as chairman of the New Jersey Republican Party from 1995 to 2001.
“New Jersey has lost a giant and I have lost a dear friend,” Assembly Minority Leader John DiMaio, a Warren County Republican, said in a statement. “Chuck was the heart and soul of New Jersey politics. His tireless commitment to this condition has inspired everyone around him, including me.”
Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat, said Haytayan had a “distinguished career in service to New Jersey,” becoming “a household name in the Garden State.”
Khaitayan was born in the Bronx in 1938 to parents who survived the Armenian Genocide. He later worked several odd jobs to pay his way through college and eventually earned his degree in electrical engineering from the University of Alabama. He worked for several engineering firms but also ran a dry cleaning business for 16 years.
Politics attracted in the 70s. Khaitayan was elected to the Mansfield School Board and then a Warren County Freeholder in 1976. He was elected to the Assembly four years later in 1981.
Haytaiain later served as both House Majority and Minority Leader before becoming Speaker in 1992, a position he held for four years until 1996. During his tenure, one of New Jersey’s highest-ranking – Republicans controlled both the governor’s office and the Legislature in the now-blue state.
As speaker, Khaitayan helped introduce the Whitman income tax cut, led the fight to cut the state sales tax by a cent, and fought for the nation’s first legally mandated Holocaust education program.
Former Speaker of the State Assembly Chuck Khaitayan in 2003.Star-Ledger file photo
But Khaitayan lost his bid for the US Senate in 1994 to Lautenberg, then a two-term senator, even though Republicans – two years into the presidency of Democrat Bill Clinton – took control of Congress for the first time in 40 years.
“I really hope for the people of New Jersey and the people of the United States that Senator Lautenberg has learned from this campaign that people want government to cut spending, cut taxes and fight crime,” Khaitayan said after his loss. “And most of all, they don’t want the government to waste their money.”
After that race, Khaitayan declined to see a seventh term in the Assembly and instead became head of the state Republican Party. He ran for the Assembly again in 2003, but finished third in the Republican primary.
When Khaitayan stepped down as chairman in 1996, Whitman praised him for having “done the agenda”.
“He’s a man of his word,” said then-Gov.
However, Haytaian’s release was mired in controversy. In 1996, Beth Herbert, a staff member of the Legislature, sued Khaitayan for sexual harassment, alleging that he kissed and fondled her several times between 1994 and 1995. Khaitayan denied the charges of defamation.
Both cases were dismissed when the state paid Herbert a $175,000 settlement. The state also paid $170,000 in attorneys’ fees to defend Khaitayan.
New Jersey Media Studies Editor Vinessa Erminio contributed to this report.
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Brent Johnson can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on X at @johnsb01.