Controversies
In 2006, Lonegan asked the outdoor advertising company, CBS Outdoor, to remove a McDonald’s advertisement in Spanish from a local billboard. The company refused. Without apparent legal remedy, Lonegan filed papers for a public referendum in Bogota on making English the official language for the municipality. The public question was rejected by the County Clerk’s office, which is partly responsible for officiating elections, on legal advice that it violated state and federal law.
The next year, Lonegan hired two illegal aliens, paying them each $80 to put together political signs for Americans for Prosperity. Lonegan left the men to do the work at a property he owned in town, where they were picked up by police after a neighbor spotted them. Lonegan said the men had told him they had legal documentation and later argued that local police, angered by tough labor negotiations with his office, had targeted him.
On January 19, 2008, Lonegan and a local radio talk show host were arrested by New Jersey State Police troopers for trespassing at a town hall meeting scheduled by Gov. Corzine at a high school in Middle Township, New Jersey. Lonegan and the radio host were standing on the school's lawn protesting when police and school officials asked them to move to a designated protest area and remove a sign they were holding. Police arrested them when they refused. School officials later apologized and police dropped the charges.
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