New Jersey gave Shirley U. Emehelu the hardest part of the lieutenant governor’s job before it gave her the job itself, which she took on November 9, 2026.
Emehelu, a Nigerian-born lawyer who moved to the United States at the age of 3, had already been acting state comptroller and acting secretary of state. When Lt. Gov. Dale G. Caldwell resigned on September 25, 2026, after an independent investigation into his conduct, Gov. Mikie Sherrill handed Emehelu oversight of New Jersey’s elections. The title came six weeks later, and the governor’s announcement credits her with running those elections smoothly.
She is the first immigrant to hold the office, and her appointment makes New Jersey the first state led by a woman governor and a woman lieutenant governor at the same time. She keeps the secretary of state’s office as well.
Nobody was taking a chance on her. Emehelu spent nine years prosecuting complex financial fraud at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Jersey, as chief of asset recovery and anti money laundering. From 2022 to 2024, she was executive assistant attorney general, the third-ranking job in that office, coordinating oversight of more than 500 attorneys.
“I’ve spent my career upholding the law, protecting families, and rooting out fraud, abuse, and corruption,” she said.
Sheila Y. Oliver, the first Black woman elected to statewide office in New Jersey, held the same post from 2018 until her death in 2023.
