Lots more great material for Da Boss's next album. 

J.R. Dunn | July 16, 2026

This past spring, Blue America suffered yet another critical blow without much in the way of comment: Standard Oil of New Jersey fled the state for Texas.

Of course, it’s not called Standard Oil anymore. Following several takeovers and mergers, it’s now known as ExxonMobil. But it’s still the same company founded nearly a century and a half ago as the jewel in the crown of John D. Rockefeller’s industrial empire. And now it’s gone.

On March 10 of this year, the company’s board voted unanimously to make the move. The decision was put to a shareholder vote on May 27. No less than 71.3%, nearly three-quarters of corporate shareholders representing 3.5 million shares, concurred. You could scarcely get that number to vote to change the color of the company logo.

And so the largest, wealthiest, and most prominent corporation in the Garden State, a company that had held that status since 1882, ended its connection with New Jersey. Much will remain. The network of gas stations will still exist, as will the Bayway Refinery, one of the largest in the country. But ExxonMobil will no longer be subject to the rules, regulations, and taxes of a state that hates it and has done its best to drive it out.

ExxonMobil isn’t the first company to go, only the largest. It’s the latest in a long line going back over a decade. Hertz moved its headquarters to Florida in 2013. Mercedes-Benz USA moved to Georgia in 2015. More recently, Honeywell moved to North Carolina.

And just last week, electronics giant Samsung announced that it was moving from Englewood Cliffs, across the Hudson from Manhattan, to Plano, a suburb of Dallas.

A number of other companies have made lesser but still significant cuts. Anheuser-Busch shut down its Newark brewery. Stop & Shop closed down ten stores. Rite Aid closed several dozen stores in the wake of its recent bankruptcy. Macy’s, Kohls, and REI have closed primary retail locations. And Johnson and Johnson, the state’s largest healthcare corporation and the corporate savior of New Brunswick (the city in the 1970s was........

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