A New Jersey legislator introduced a bill to ban lawmakers from using cellphones at the Statehouse

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The New Jersey legislature approved a bell-to-bell cellphone ban for all students attending public school nine months ago. Now a legislator who opposed the measure wants lawmakers to put down their cellphones as well.

“You can’t give a speech in Trenton without somebody somewhere in there playing Candy Crush,” said Assemblyman Brian Bergen, R-Morris, “or checking their fantasy [football] lineup for the weekend, or sometimes probably gambling on their phones.”

On Thursday, Bergen introduced the “Practice What We Preach Act,” legislation that imposes a cellphone ban when lawmakers attend committee meetings and voting sessions at the Statehouse.

The measure would bar members of the Legislature from possessing or making non-legislative use of an internet-enabled device from the moment the presiding officer calls the body to order until adjournment of any quorum call, voting session or committee meeting.

“The bill calls for lockers to be installed outside of all the committee rooms and the legislature,” he said. “Members of the legislature would have to put all their internet-enabled devices in those lockers before they go in.”

Bergen said this would encourage lawmakers to focus on what they’re doing.

“They’re saying kids can’t focus enough to learn, but they can vote on billions of dollars in legislation while playing Candy Crush, it’s crazy,” he said.

Bergen, a Republican, was one of a small number of legislators to vote against the school cell ban, which took effect earlier this month when the 2026-27 school year began.

He said when the measure was first introduced, he felt it was silly.

“Most school districts already had it under control, they had methods to control it,” he said. “But the legislature is full of dinosaurs, and they wanted to go with this thing, so I decided if we’re going to do it for schools, why not do it for us?”

Bergen said his legislation specifies that any member of the legislature who does not adhere to the cellphone ban would face a disorderly persons offense.

“It’s a disorderly persons offense if you carry a beeper in a school,” Bergen said. “So I figured, why not match that?”

In New Jersey, a disorderly persons offense is a criminal offense, punishable by up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine.

He said the bill also calls for violators to face detention.

“So they have to stay for an hour after the session ends, sit there, and kind of reflect on what was happening during the session,” he said.

Bergen said that even though there is virtually no chance that the Democrat-controlled legislature will pass his bill, he believes it’s important to introduce it anyway.

“The idea here is to wake them up and make them realize how stupid it would be for this to happen to them, and how they should probably not pass these types of laws that affect other people,” he said.

Bergen said he believes members of the legislature are constantly passing laws that impact other people but don’t affect them.

“Or they make a carve-out for an industry that they like, or they find ways to exempt other entities, and focus these bills on people that are not in their sphere of influence,” he said. “It’s ridiculous and I hope it wakes them up to see the stupidity of what they’re actually doing.”