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In a curious remark made during Gov. Christie’s Thursday morning press conference, the governor seemed to contradict his statement about only learning about the lane closure scheme on Wednesday morning when his communications director contacted him after a local newspaper went live with the story. However, moments later, Christie said that he “lost sleep the past two nights” over the revelations.
Whether it was a misstatement or not, the possible slip did not go unnoticed on Twitter:
Tweets about “christie sleep”
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At a press conference Thursday morning, Gov. Chris Christie announced that he has fired his top aide, Bridget Anne Kelly, for her role in a “vengeful” scheme to punish a New Jersey town for its mayor not endorsing Christie for reelection.
According to AP:
Republican Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey claims he had no knowledge that one of his highest level staffers actively sought to conspire with a member of the state’s Port Authority to close access to a highly trafficked bridge in order to serve retribution to a Democratic mayor who refused to endorse Christie during his last reelection campaign.
“I am outraged and deeply saddened to learn that not only was I misled by a member of my staff, but this completely inappropriate and unsanctioned conduct was made without my knowledge,” Christie said in a prepared statement on Wednesday after emails were published in a local paper showing that his deputy chief of staff Bridget Anne Kelly made explicit overtures to mess with the town of Fort Lee’s on-ramps to the George Washington Bridge.
“Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee,” Kelly wrote from her private email address to David Wildstein, a Christie-appointed executive with the Port Authority that maintains the state’s roadways and bridges.
As the Guardian reports:
The governor’s statement Wednesday was not delivered publicly. Though he said those involved would be “held responsible,” he did not indicate that any disciplinary actions or firing of staff, including Ms. Kelly, had yet taken place.
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