They faced a primary and beat Wayne mayor Newton Edward Miller, Norman Lapidus, a businessman from Maplewood, Melvin I. Tolstoi, and Shirley Szabo.
In November, Burgio and Remington prevailed over the Democrats, Livingston mayor Donald S. Coburn and Bernie Reiner.
Burgio and Remington both wanted to run for the Senate, but when their shared hometown of North Caldwell was moved into a different district, neither of them ran for anything.
[3] After Kean was elected Governor of New Jersey in 1981, he asked Burgio to become his Secretary of State, making her the first woman to serve in that role.
In 1996, Burgio attempted a political comeback as a candidate for the position of Surrogate of Essex County, but lost by a very big margin.