A New Jersey school board candidate was caught red-handed sending vicious, sexual messages about a conservative female board member in a group chat labeled “ThisBitchNeedsToDie.”
Photos of Scott Semaya’s vile texts about Danielle Bellomo at a July school board meeting leaked this week on social media — and the widening scandal is now being investigated by local cops and roiling the affluent suburb of Marlboro.
“Bellomo must be cold — her nips could cut glass right n” read one text, allegedly captured on camera while Semaya’s fingers typed an “o.”
Outrage was immediate, and Semaya this week dropped out of the race for the Marlboro Board of Education, followed by his running mate Melissa Goldberg.
The scandal in the leafy Monmouth County enclave has drawn parallels to the recent controversy in Virginia, where attorney general candidate Jay Jones was recently outed for a 2022 text message suggesting the state’s then-Republican House Speaker deserved to be shot in the head.
“It was absolutely terrifying,” Bellomo exclusively told The Post. “When I found out about the messages I was absolutely shocked, especially with the climate of our country. It sent chills down my spine.
Bellomo, 38, is a MAGA-loving, President Trump-supporting mom of three and staunch Republican, who poses in a star-spangled bikini for her Facebook profile picture. She believes she has been targeted for her politics.
“I’m a proud and unapologetic advocate for parental rights, for my children, for our town and our state and for that they have this hate for me,” she said.
Semaya, 38, an accountant who has voiced progressive liberal views, was one of five candidates running for three open seats on the Marlboro Board of Education. He cited only “family circumstances” in announcing his exit from the race. He did not return multiple messages seeking comment.
“My whole family has been affected by it,” Bellomo said, noting her older son, 12, was likely to see the nasty text.
Ironically, Bellomo was once Semaya’s daughter’s Girl Scouts leader.
“This is heartbreaking for me,” she said. “This is what he was thinking when I was volunteering with his children — it’s a hard pill to swallow.”
Bellomo, who is serving her first full, three-year term on the board, said she’s been subjected to months of online threats and made several police reports.
While the social media post about the “ThisBitchNeedstoDie” group text included just a single shot of Semaya’s cell phone, Bellomo said she’s seen several other images of the messages exchanged by the group including “very specific actions that they want to do to me and what their intention is.
“These text messages are the first time I was able to see they don’t want me alive,” she added, declining to share the additional images.
Bellomo said she has a protective order against one person allegedly in the group chat: Mitesh Gandhi, whose wife is a board member. Gandhi declined comment and referred The Post to his lawyer, who said he was moving to dismiss the protective order.
The vicious chat group was believed to be composed of five men, and allegedly included Chad Hyett, current Marlboro school board vice president, according to a source. Many in the town of 41,000 are now calling for Hyett’s resignation.
Hyett, who in December filed a School Ethics Commission complaint against Bellomo after she posted part of a board email on social media, did not return a message. The commission did not substantiate Hyett’s complaint.
Bellomo claimed Marlboro Schools Superintendent Michael Ballone “would not provide protection” at a board meeting this week, after the text message controversy erupted.
“The district takes the safety and security of all members of our school community very seriously,” Ballone said. “We have an invaluable relationship with our local police department who attends our Board of Education meetings. This upcoming meeting will be no different.”
Marlboro’s Democratic mayor, Jonathan Hornik, condemned the messages as “completely unacceptable,” adding, “those responsible are clearly not equipped to hold public office.”
“Violence and threats of violence against public officials are seemingly becoming normalized,” he said in a statement. “In only a few months’ time, we have witnessed an alarming escalation in this type of behavior to an extreme, culminating in the murders of Minnesota Representative [Melissa] Hortman and activist Charlie Kirk. This must stop.”
Meanwhile, the sleepy town of Marlboro, where the average home is priced at $850,000, has become a social media battleground.
“This guy presents himself as a father and family man to the public only to then conduct himself like a pervert and criminal on a group chat during a BOE Meeting,” wrote former board member Aldo Patruno of Semaya.
“This is disgusting on every level,” another online commenter said.
“These grown men need to be arrested for threats on one’s life,” another wrote on Instagram.
Semaya and Goldberg were running on a purportedly apolitical slate called Collaborators for Responsible Education, or CORE. The third candidate on the slate, longtime incumbent Michael Lilonsky, remains in the race. He did not return a message.
Goldberg told New Jersey’s Patch.com she was abandoning her bid for the board because she “currently cannot commit to this role in addition to my other responsibilities.”
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