Christie to hold press conference this afternoon

MMM photo/Art Gallagher

Governor Chris Christie will end his 75 day exile from the New Jersey press corps this afternoon at 2:30 with a press conference in his outer office.

Christie has not taken questions from the press since his January 9 marathon press conference about the revelations that members of his team had orchestrated the George Washington Bridge lane closures last September.

Yesterday the lawyers that Christie hired to investigate GWB lane closures and Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer’s allegations that he, through Lt. Governor Kim Guadagno, threaten to withhold Sandy relief from Hoboken unless Zimmer secured a zoning approval for the Rockefeller Group, a client of Port Authority Chairman David Samson, released their findings.  The report backed up Christie’s claims from his January 9 press conference that he had no involvement in the lane closures and Guadagno’s denial of Zimmer’s allegations.  The investigation cost New Jersey taxpayers roughly $1 million.

The report blamed Christie’s former Deputy Chief of Staff Bridget Ann Kelly and his former #2 at Port Authority David Wildstein for the GWB lane closures and concluded that the widely speculated motive for the lane closures…political retribution against Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich…did not make sense. The report says the motive for the lane closures remains a mystery.  Kelly’s termination from Christie’s staff was announced at the January 9 press conference, the day after her “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee” email to Wildstein became public.

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Bridgegate Investigation Press Conference

CNN is broadcasting the media briefing from Randy Mastro of Gibson Dunn, the lead investigator for the Christie Administration into “Bridgegate”, the scandal involving the Geroge Washington Bridge lane closures last September and Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer’s allegations that Lt. Gov. Kim Guadango and others in the Administration held Sandy aid for Hoboken hostage pending a development approval that Zimmer did not want to give.

The CNN Live Stream can be found here.

An advance copy of the Mastro report concludes that Governor Chris Christie was not aware of the GWB lane closures and has told the truth about it since his January 9 press conference.  Christie was reportedly in tear when he learned that his Deputy Chief of Staff Bridget Ann Kelly had repeatedly lied about her involvement in the lane closures.

The report concludes that Kelly, and David Wildstein, then Christie’s #2 at the Port Authority of NY/NJ acted alone. After 70 interviews and reviewing 250,000 documents, Mastro and his team did not uncover the motivation for the lane closures.

With regard to Zimmer’s allegations, Mastro’s team concluded that the Mayor’s allegations are “unsubstantiated and materially false.

The 345 page, “thorough and exhaustive report” can be viewed here

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