. I wonder what cable news channel Christ Christie watched tonight? Was he curious enough to sit through what Rachel Maddow had to say about him and his disproved denials?
Needless to say, it was must see t.v. and something wonderful to behold. With the skills of Sherlock Holmes, she identified every discrepancy in Christie's assertions and tore apart every inkling of credibility that he might have hoped to retain. She flat out said that statements he has made are provably not true. She might as well have just used the word liar. And then she went on to prove it.
If you weren't glued to your television when it aired, here is the video at MSNBC. And if you are not able to watch video, the transcript is below the orange mangled traffic cone. (H/T to NYFM for that description.)
P.S. If you can't get enough of the juicy details of this scandal and have some time, check out a diary I read earlier that was written by
, who obviously did a lot of research to find just about every instance that Mayor Sokolich was quoted or mentioned in an article going back to September about the Bridge closing and whether or not it was a punishment coming from the administration:
Rachel Maddow: "[T]he reason this photo is particularly awkward for New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is because the guy he is interacting with in this photo, the guy in the dark coat and the white shirt and the red tie is David Wildstein; the Chris Christie administration political appointee to the Port Authority who personally organized the shutdown of the bridge lanes. "
This is awkward. This is a photo taken on 9/11. It was taken this past September 11th, 2013 and it’s at the World Trade Center site in lower Manhattan. This photo was published today in this morning's Wall Street Journal. Now, one of the ambient things about the New Jersey bridge scandal that has always been particularly disgusting about this scandal is the fact that the bridge shutdown happened on the week of September 11th. I mean, if there are dirty tricks going on in politics somewhere, even in the New York City area, it's not like everybody expects September 11th to be an Armistice Day for politics or anything. But grid locking a town in northern New Jersey and portions of the George Washington Bridge on September 11th was particularly nasty. Not only for people in New Jersey who might have wanted to use the bridge to get to 9/11 commemorative events, this was, after all, a very hard hit area of the country; but also because, frankly, the bridge, itself, is seen as a potential terrorist target. It's not just a landmark. It is the busiest bridge in the world. And on the anniversary of 9/11, you worry, right? The mayor of Fort Lee told The New York Times this week that while the bridge lanes were closed, quote, his blood pressure rose “two ticks each day.” But he says it, quote, went up twice that on September 11th, specifically. [See A Bridge to Scandal: Behind the Fort Lee Ruse by N. R. Kleinfield, The New York Times, 12 Jan 2014]
But the reason this photo, which was taken on September 11th during the traffic jam, the reason this photo is particularly awkward for New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is because the guy he is interacting with in this photo, the guy in the dark coat and the white shirt and the red tie is David Wildstein; the Chris Christie administration political appointee to the Port Authority who personally organized the shutdown of the bridge lanes. When the Governor's Deputy Chief of Staff ordered, quote, Time for Some Traffic Problems in Fort Lee (PDF), it was David Wildstein who responded, Got It. And it was then David Wildstein who over the course of the next few weeks at the Port Authority secretly organized the traffic engineers, and maintenance department and the bridge general manager and everybody else who had to be in on it, to get those lanes shut down. And then he swore them all to secrecy in terms of not letting anybody in Fort Lee know what was about to hit them.
That was David Wildstein who was calling the Fort Lee mayor that little Serbian. It was David Wildstein the guy who said don't feel bad for those children who are stuck in those traffic jams, in the first day, in the first week of school in Fort Lee because, quote, those are the children of Buono voters, Buono being the Democratic candidate who was running against Chris Christie. That was David Wildstein who ordered radio silence as the response to complaints from the mayor and other Fort Lee officials, even when what they were complaining about was delayed ambulances trying to get to injured people and people who were having heart attacks. That's David Wildstein, and that's David Wildstein with Chris Christie during the bridge shutdown on September 11th. And for a governor who is desperately trying to distance himself from the scandal, trying to say he had nothing to do with it, I mean it is awkward enough for there now to be photographic evidence that he was with the guy who shut down the bridge while the bridge was shut down. But it's even worse than that for Governor Christie because of the Governor's insistent, even over the top, efforts to try to deny any connection with David Wildstein; to try to deny personal history, any past association, even any real current familiarity with the guy who he is seen talking to right there.
Video of Chris Christie at Thursday 9 Jan 2014 Press Conference:
Question at press conference: [inaudible] … friend David Wildstein?
Chris Christie: Let me just clear something up, okay? About my childhood friend, David Wildstein. It is true that I met david in 1977 in high school. He's a year older than me. David and I were not friends in high school. We were not even acquaintances in high school. I mean, I had a high school in Livingston, a three-year high school that had 1,800 students in a 3-year high school in the late '70s/early 1980s. I knew who David Wildstein was. I met David on the Tom Kean for Governor Campaign in 1977. He was a youth volunteer and so was I. Really after that time I completely lost touch with David. We didn't travel in the same circles in high school. You know, I was the class president and athlete. I don't know what David was doing during that period of time. [Break in Tape] I have had no contact with David Wildstein in a long time; a long time. Well before the election. You know, I could probably count on one hand the number of conversations I've had with David since he worked at the Port Authority. I did not interact with David.
Rachel Maddow: "A couple of months before the traffic jam, there again is the Governor interacting with David. This is in June at another Port authority event."
I did not interact with David. During the traffic jam, there is the Governor interacting with David. [The 9/11/13 picture is shown on screen again.] A couple of months before the traffic jam, there again is the Governor interacting with David. This is in June at another Port authority event. In case you're interested, the guy on the right, that's David Samson, the Port Authority Chairman. And the guy on the left, that's Bill Baroni, the other guy who had to resign along with David Wildstein. But in the middle there, that is our hero Governor Chris Christie and, again, David Wildstein. The governor says he can count on one hand the number of times he has interacted with David Wildstein since David Wildstein was hired at the Port Authority back in 2010. Well if Mr. Christie has the expected number of fingers, that would mean it has only happened five times and, hey, there just happens to be photographs available of two of those five times, including one taken during the shutdown on September 11th.
There's something else going on, too though, that does not jibe with how the Governor has explained this scandal and his knowledge of if and his role in it. The day after this picture was taken of Chris Christie and David Wildstein together during the traffic jam on September 11th, the day after that, that was a Thursday, the day … so that was a Wednesday. The day after that was a Thursday which is while the shutdown was still going on. And on Thursday, the day after that photo was taken. Thursday. This email was sent between two people who work in Governor Christie's office; between two of his top staffers. Christina Genovese Renna. She’s the Director of Departmental Relations for the State of New Jersey. I know it’s obscure. A lot of people have job titles like that in New Jersey. It can be confusing. In this case what it means is that she worked in the Governor's office and she reported to Bridget Kelly, who’s the Governor's Deputy Chief of Staff who we now know is the person who ordered Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee, to which David Wildstein responded, Got it. So during the shutdown, while it was still happening before the Executive Director of the Authority intervened and forced them to stop doing what they were doing, Fort Lee was into its fourth day of gridlock because of this manmade shutdown. And on that fourth day, on Thursday, Christina Renna wrote to Bridget Kelly this email about the Fort Lee traffic disaster and the mayor of Fort Lee.
Dear Bridget, this afternoon Evan received a call from Mayor Sokolich. The Mayor’s extremely upset about the reduction of toll lanes from 3 to 1. Not only is it causing horrendous traffic backup in town, but first responders are having a terrible time maneuvering the traffic because the backup is so severe. The Mayor told Evan he has no idea why Port Authority decided to do this, but there is a feeling in town that it is government retribution for something. He simply can't understand why that would be the case however, because he has always been so supportive of the Governor. Evan told the fine Mayor, he was unaware the toll lanes were closed, but would see what he could find out.
This is an email during the bridge shutdown. It's to Bridget Kelly who ordered the bridge shutdown. It is from Christina Renna, who worked in the Governor's office. The Evan who is referenced in the email, we think is probably Evan J. Ridley, who also works in the Governor's office. Nobody seems to know what his exact job title is other than Aide to the Governor. Public payroll information shows that he works in the Governor's office as an Aide and gets paid $52,000 a year. Other than that, all we know is that he works in the Governor's office. All of them do. And that means that during the shut down, three people who work in the Governor’s office are emailing about the ongoing bridge lane shutdown and the disaster that it's causing and the allegation that it's politically motivated. There’s no discussion whatsoever about there being some traffic study which the Governor says was the prevailing belief about what was happening with that bridge. And this was contemporaneous to the problem. This wasn’t long after the fact when there’s some newspaper article about it in retrospect that alerted everybody that in fact there had been some problem that’s now resolved. This was during the event. And that means that the Governor has absolutely and blatantly not told the truth about what was going on in his office.
Video of Chris Christie at Thursday 9 Jan 2014 Press Conference:
Question: What about the cover-up piece of this?
Chris Christie: Yeah, well that's your characterization, not mine. But there is nobody on my staff who had any knowledge of this issue until after the issue was already done.
That is not true. But here's the other part of this that makes no sense against the Governor's description of what happened here and why nobody should believe that he was not involved. Remember, Governor Christie's defense, in part, is that this sort of thing, the shutdown of the bridge couldn't have been done to punish the Mayor of Fort Lee because Governor Christie says he didn't even know who the Mayor of Fort Lee was. He couldn't pick him out of a lineup. This guy was not on his radar. Pick your metaphor for “I don't know the guy.” Governor Christie has insisted on it.
Video of Chris Christie at Thursday 9 Jan 2014 Press Conference:
Chris Christie: The other part of this that just shocks me is, as I said to you all many times before, Mayor Sokolich was never on my radar screen. [Break in tape.] I don't remember ever meeting Mayor Sokolich. [Break in tape.] Until I saw his picture last night on television, I wouldn't have been able to pick him out of a lineup. [Break in tape.]
Reporter: Did any one say to you, well the Mayor of Fort Lee he’s going with your opponent?
Chris Christie: He never men… His name was never mentioned to me. His position was never mentioned to me. [Break in tape.] I never heard the Fort Lee mayor's name, Mark Sokolich, his name until all this stuff happened. And so he was not on my radar screen at all. Plenty of other mayors were. [Break in tape.] I don't know this guy. [Break in tape.] I mean, I don't know this guy. [Break in tape.] But I'm telling you, until yesterday when I saw his picture on tv, I wouldn't … if he walked in a room, I wouldn't have been able to pick him out.
That's a big part of the governor's defense. I've never heard of this guy. Nobody's ever heard of this guy. Why would anybody bother to try to hurt this guy who nobody's heard of in his town that nobody's ever heard of? Right? But then look at the first line of this email sent from two of the Governor's top staffers, while the shutdown was still under way.
Look. This afternoon, Evan received a call from Mayor Sokolich. Not Evan received a call from a Mayor named Mark Sokolich from Fort Lee or from the Mayor of Fort Lee, a man named Mark Sokolich. No, it’s this afternoon, Evan received a call from Mayor Sokolich. No further explanation needed.
And then look at this in the same email, It came from a number he was not familiar with that was actually a secretary who patched the Mayor through to Evan. That's the way the email to Bridget Kelly starts. Essentially saying, Hey, don't be mad. Right? I'm really sorry to tell you Evan took a call from Mayor you know who.And then the closing line of the email is this: Evan told the fine Mayor he was unaware that the toll lanes were closed, but would see what he could find out. Now undoubtedly, Mayor Sokolich is a fine mayor. He's very fine. I'm no expert. Fine. But why the snark? Right? The fine .. why the fine Mayor snark here? If this is some anonymous mayor who nobody in the Governor's office has ever heard of, why the implicit apology for having taken his call? Oh, Evan didn't recognize the number. That's the only reason he took it. The number was a secretary's number. Implicitly, otherwise he would have known not to take the call. And then in closing, this backhanded fine Mayor, like ah, this jerk complaining about the first responders not being able to get to people having heart attacks. Right?
The Governor's top staff were discussing the shutdown, the effect of it, the allegations of political retribution and the Mayor of Fort Lee in provocative terms while the shutdown was still happening. Despite Governor Christie's denials, it seems like something was going on between the Governor's office and that specific mayor; that specific man. And lots of people who work directly for Governor Christie and who work in the Governor's office and who are in the Governor's inner circle were in discussions about that shutdown while it was happening.
Rachel Maddow: "The Governor's top staff were discussing the shutdown, the effect of it, the allegations of political retribution and the Mayor of Fort Lee in provocative terms while the shutdown was still happening."
Obviously, Bridget Kelly, the Governor’s Deputy Chief of Staff, the one who said Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee. Now we also know Christina Renna, the Governor's Department of Departmental Relations who send sent the email about the mayor to Bridget Kelly while the shutdown was still happening. We also know involved in that email, one of the Governor's Aides, Evan J. Ridley. We also know the Governor’s Campaign Manager, Bill Stepien, a few days after the shutdown he wrote to David Wildstein, quote, the mayor is an idiot, talking about the Mayor of Fort Lee. Regina Egea, who was the Director of the Authorities Unit on Chris Christie's staff when the shutdown happened and who’s now next in line to be his Chief of Staff after the one that he had before is promoted to Attorney General. Well the morning that the toll lanes were opened up again, she got sent the angry letter from the Port Authority Executive Director who had been kept totally out of the loop of the shutdown and who reacted with fury when he figured out what was going on, saying he, quote, believed this hasty and ill-advised decision violates Federal Law and the laws of both States. The Governor's soon to be Chief of Staff Regina Egea got that email sent to her marked with high importance on the last morning of the shutdown as the lanes were finally being reopened.
The [Governor’s] spokesman Michael Drewniak, just days after the shutdown, he’s fielding inquiries from reporters who are starting to call about it. When the Christie appointees at the Port Authority start to freak out about the press, this is how it goes. David Wildstein texts Bill Baroni, hey, the Wall Street Journal just called my cell phone. Bill Baroni responds, Jesus. Less than a minute later, Call Drewniak. Call Drewniak, Mr. Drewniak, Mr. Christie’s spokesman. The Governor’s spokesman, the Governor’s campaign manager, the Governor’s deputy chief of staff, his top two appointees at the Port Authority, an aide to the Governor, the governor's new chief of staff, the Governor’s director of departmental relations; they are all in the loop on this crisis while it's still under way and immediately thereafter.
Video of Chris Christie at Thursday 9 Jan 2014 Press Conference:
There was nobody on my staff who had any knowledge of this issue until after the issue was already done.
That is not true. Provably not true. Today, remarkably, the gods of timing blessed us with this. Governor Christie had to give his state of the state address in New Jersey today because it is the start of a new legislative session. His very first words in the state of the state address were about the scandal. Even know he never described it directly.
Video of Chris Christie at Thursday 14 Jan 2014 State of the State Address: The last week has certainly tested this administration. Mistakes were clearly made. And as a result, we let down the people we're entrusted to serve. I know our citizens deserve better; much better. I'm the Governor and I'm ultimately responsible for all that happens on my watch, both good and bad. Now without a doubt, we will cooperate with all appropriate inquiries to ensure that this breach of trust does not happen again. But I also want to assure the people of New Jersey today that what has occurred does not define us or our state.
Not to be blunt, but nobody thinks that shutting down that bridge as an act of political retaliation is something that defines the people of New Jersey. Nobody I know from New Jersey did that, except maybe Chris Christie or at least the people who work for Chris Christie. This is an opposite of an I feel your pain moment. This is a don't you feel my pain moment. I want to assure you that this doesn't define us. Nobody’s worried about it defining anybody except you. We'll see.
Substantively, what the Governor said there about the ongoing investigation into this matter may end up being important. What he said specifically, I'll quote him directly was, quote, we will cooperate with all appropriate inquiries to ensure this breach of trust does not happen again.
Well, in order to make sure this does not happen again, we still need to know what happened here in the first place, and why it happened, and who did it. Whether or not the Governor thinks that is an appropriate inquiry or not, that's what he said, we'll cooperate with all appropriate inquiries [air quotes], whether or not he thinks that inquiry is appropriate, it happening. In an ongoing way in terms of a potential criminal investigation being looked into by the federal prosecutor in New Jersey but also aggressively in the New Jersey state legislature; both in the Senate and in the Assembly. Tomorrow they're going to be convening to define and vote for the remit and the powers of these new investigative committees that they are putting on this scandal. Heading into that new phase of the investigation that starts tomorrow is the uncomfortable fact for Governor Chris Christie that his own assertions thus far about what he knew when, and who he was in contact with, and who was involved in his direct staff, all of those assertions are looking pretty wobbly at this point.