Emails link top Christie aide to GWB lane-closing controversy

[mota bhai 2,675]

Private messages between Governor’s Christie’s deputy chief of staff and two of his top executives at the Port Authority reveal a vindictive effort to create “traffic problems in Fort Lee” by shutting lanes to the George Washington Bridge and apparent pleasure at the resulting gridlock.

...

The documents obtained by The Record raise serious doubts about months of claims by the Christie administration that the September closures of local access lanes to the George Washington Bridge were part of a traffic study initiated solely by the Port Authority. Instead, they show that one of the governor’s top aides was deeply involved in the decision to choke off the borough’s access to the bridge, and they provide the strongest indication yet that it was part of a politically-motivated vendetta—a notion that Christie has publicly denied.

“Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee,” Bridget Anne Kelly, one of three deputies on Christie’s senior staff, wrote to David Wildstein, a top Christie executive at the Port Authority, on Aug. 13, about three weeks before the closures. Wildstein, the official who ordered the closures and who resigned last month amid the escalating scandal, wrote back: “Got it.”

...

The private messages, mostly sent through personal e-mails accounts, indicate that Kelly, a senior staff member in the governor’s office, was involved in the planning and received updates during the week of the traffic jams. She was also informed that week that Christie’s executives at the Port Authority were ignoring the Fort Lee mayor’s desperate attempts to get a reason for the sudden unannounced closures, as the borough’s first responders struggled to respond to emergencies and buses arrived late on the first day of school.

On Sept. 9, the first morning of the lane closures, Kelly asked in an e-mail if Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich’s numerous calls to Port Authority officials had been returned.

“Radio silence,” Wildstein replied. “His name comes right after mayor Fulop,” an apparent reference to Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop, who also said this week that the Christie administration had retaliated against him last year because he didn’t endorse the governor for re-election.

...

In one exchange of text messages on the second day of the lane closures, Wildstein alludes to messages the Fort Lee mayor had left complaining that school buses were having trouble getting through the traffic.

“Is it wrong that I’m smiling,” the recipient of the text message responded to Wildstein. The person’s identity is not clear because the documents are partially redacted for unknown reasons.

“No,” Wildstein wrote in response.

“I feel badly about the kids,” the person replied to Wildstein. “I guess.”

“They are the children of Buono voters,” Wildstein wrote, making a reference to Barbara Buono, the Democratic candidate for governor, who lost to Christie in a landslide in November.

...

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s top executive, Pat Foye, ordered an end to the lane closures after he first found out about them when The Record’s Road Warrior columnist John Cichowski called for an explanation, four days after they began.

...

“The mayor is an idiot,” Bill Stepien, Christie’s campaign manager, wrote to Wildstein on Sept. 18, in reaction to the Wall Street Journal story about local officials’ complaints.

Wildstein responded to Stepien: “It will be a tough November for this little Serbian,” an apparent reference to the Fort Lee mayor, who Baroni also referred to as “Serbia” in text messages.

http://www.northjersey.com/news/christie_kelly_bridge_lane_closures_emails.html

[mota bhai 2,675]

Link to the document - https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1003323/christie-administration-traffic-jam-correspondence.pdf

[Sarah Elle-Même 660]

Knew it.

Here's a cartoon for good measure:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/emails-link-chris-christie-aides-bridge-lane-closures-article-1.1569740

Edited January 8, 2014 by Sarah and Adnan

[mota bhai 2,675]

Now that the evidence is in, he's done. No President Christie.

[Ban Hammer 13,400]

Now that the evidence is in, he's done. No President Christie.

time to practice saying president hillary.

[mota bhai 2,675]

time to practice saying president hillary.

no.

[Ban Hammer 13,400]

no.

it will get easier in time.

[Teddy B 17,252]

AJ is no Hillary fan.

[mota bhai 2,675]

I am not, and yet there are very few Republicans I would vote for instead of her. Christie was one of them, but I guess the libs were right about the whole bully/thug thing...

[We Keep Receipts 9,238]

This sounds like a set up, hope he wasn't ambushed by his own people.

[Karee 4,190]

Is that all they got? Wow. Talk about grasping at straws.

[mota bhai 2,675]

Is that all they got? Wow. Talk about grasping at straws.

Seriously? This is huge. Did you read through the doc link in the second post?

[SMOKE 1,426]

Seriously? This is huge. Did you read through the doc link in the second post?

hell no. its 22 pages long. what did he do?

[mota bhai 2,675]

hell no. its 22 pages long. what did he do?

He did nothing. His people did a lot. It's going to come down to whether he had knowledge or not. There's a lot of stuff redacted in the document which will be revealed later. I think he'll be fine as far as staying Governor (he won't have to resign) but this stuff will move numbers in a primary or general.

[We Keep Receipts 9,238]

He did nothing. His people did a lot. It's going to come down to whether he had knowledge or not. There's a lot of stuff redacted in the document which will be revealed later. I think he'll be fine as far as staying Governor (he won't have to resign) but this stuff will move numbers in a primary or general.

Even if he DID know, I'd wager he'll never admit something like this.