Two Chris Christie aides embroiled in Bridgegate had a hot and heavy romance before the scandal exploded, it was revealed yesterday, as the New Jersey governor claimed that the entire mess ruined his appetite.
“You don’t sleep, you don’t eat . . . you struggle,’’ he told ABC’s Diane Sawyer Thursday, hours after he released a taxpayer-funded report that he commissioned — and that predictably cleared him.
“It’s been a very, very tough time professionally. Not the toughest time in my life, but certainly the toughest time in my life professionally.”
He described as “incredibly stupid’’ the two aides whom the report holds responsible.
One of them, former chief of staff Bridget Ann Kelly, had been dating another close associate of the governor, the report said.
Kelly, 41 — who sent the infamous e-mail stating “time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee” — and ex-Christie campaign manager Bill Stepien, 36, became an item in April 2013.
They remained together until weeks before Kelly and David Wildstein, a Christie appointee to the Port Authority, allegedly decided to create a traffic nightmare in Fort Lee last September to punish its mayor for not supporting the governor’s re-election bid.
“At some point after Stepien’s departure to run the campaign, Kelly and Stepien became personally involved, although, by early August 2013, their personal relationship had cooled, apparently at Stepien’s choice, and they largely stopped speaking,” the report said.
Investigation into Governor Christie’s office re: Bridgegate
Christie fired Kelly when the scandal erupted in January.
Stepien’s lawyer, Kevin Marino, called the details of the romance “irrelevant” to the probe. “Its inclusion in the report commissioned by the governor is gratuitous and, indeed, a little silly,” he said.
The probers said Stepien knew about the lane closures, but did not realize they were meant to cripple the town.
The report placed blame for the closures squarely on Kelly and Wildstein.
The report said Wildstein claimed he told Christie about the closures as they were happening. But Christie insisted he didn’t recall any such conversation.
Asked what he thought the motivation was for the closures, Christie said didn’t know.
“I don’t believe it was for me… Sometimes people do inexplicably stupid things,” he said.
“Anybody who really knows me knows that I would not believe that doing anything inexplicably stupid would please me.”
Asked if he was clueless, Christie said that he merely “trusted too much.”
“Not clueless, but it certainly makes me feel taken advantage of,” he said.
Christie, considered a front-runner for the White House before the scandal, said Bridgegate hasn’t impacted his aspirations.
He said he has never considered resigning.
“What’s happened in the past 10 weeks I think ultimately will make me a better leader, whether it’s as governor of New Jersey or in any other job I might take in the public or private sector, ” he said.
Besides the probe commissioned by Christie, two other investigations are ongoing — one by the feds and the other by the New Jersey legislature.
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Two of Gov. Chris Christie’s closest advisers had a “personal relationship” in the months leading up to the lane closures at the George Washington Bridge, according to a report commissioned by the governor.
Bridget Anne Kelly, who sent the now-infamous email that said “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee,” and Christie’s ex-campaign manager and top aide Bill Stepien were an item between April and early August of last year, the report by lawyer Randy Mastro revealed.
“At some point after Stepien’s departure to run the campaign, Kelly and Stepien became personally involved, although, by early August 2013, their personal relationship had cooled, apparently at Stepien’s choice, and they largely stopped speaking,” the report said.
The report noted that Kelly, 41, replaced Stepien, 36, as Christie’s deputy chief of staff last April when Stepien stepped down.
“Because Stepien was her ‘benefactor,’ Kelly relied heavily on him during this transition” before the relationship soured, the report said.
Kelly was fired after news of the ”Bridgegate” scandal erupted in January. Neither was married during the time of the relationship.
Stepien’s lawyer, Kevin Marino, questioned the inclusion of the gossipy details.
“That Bill Stepien and Bridget Anne Kelly dated briefly at a time when both were single, after Mr. Stepien left the Governor’s office and before the bridge lane fiasco arose, is completely irrelevant. Its inclusion in the report commissioned by the Governor is gratuitous and, indeed, a little silly,” Marino said.
The report was based on an investigation by Mastro’s firm, Gibson Dunn, and is expected to cost New Jersey taxpayers more than $1 million.
It predictably cleared Christie of any wrongdoing and placed blame for the closures on Kelly, the governor’s former deputy chief of staff, and David Wildstein, a longtime Christie ally and appointee to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
“We found that Gov. Christie had no knowledge beforehand of this George Washington Bridge realignment idea,” Mastro said at a news conference.
The report also concluded that Stepien was aware of the plan to stall traffic.
It also stated that Wildstein said he told Christie about the closures at a public event as they were happening – but added that Christie claimed he did not remember the exchange.
“[Wildstein] even suggested he mentioned the traffic issue in Fort Lee to the Governor at a public event during the lane realignment—a reference that the Governor does not recall and, even if actually made, would not have registered with the Governor in any event because he knew nothing about this decision in advance and would not have considered another traffic issue at one of the bridges or tunnels to be memorable,” the report said.
Christie did not immediately comment, saying Wednesday night he was still reading the 360-page document.
But he will appear with Diane Sawyer on ABC World News Thursday night.
The normally motor-mouthed governor has not held a news conference since January.
The scheme to block two of the three access lanes approaching the GWB from Fort Lee, NJ, beginning last Sept. 9 was widely believed to be retaliation against Democratic Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich, who didn’t endorse Christie for re-election.
But Mastro’s report didn’t offer a motive.
“What motivated this act is not yet clear. The common speculation that this was an act of political retaliation because Mayor Sokolich failed to endorse the Governor for re-election is not established by the evidence that we have seen,” it said.
The scandal has haunted the Republican governor since it broke and jeopardized any plans he had to run for the White House in 2016.
But Christie said Wednesday night that he has made no decisions about his political future.
“There is certainly nothing that has happened in the last number of months … that would make me think any differently about my ability to pursue that job or to perform in it,” Christie said on his monthly radio call-in program, TownSquare Media’s “Ask the Governor.”
Mastro said that Christie, 51, turned over his cellphone and allowed his email accounts to be searched.
The Mastro-led team of lawyers interviewed more than 70 people and reviewed roughly 250,000 documents.
But Democrats have said the report is incomplete because it does not include interviews with people central to the plot, including Kelly, Wildstein, Stepien, Sokolich or former Port Authority appointee Bill Baroni.
Assemblyman John Wisniewski and Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, who are heading a joint probe into the administration, dismissed the report.
“Lawyers hired by and paid by the Christie administration itself to investigate the governor’s office who then say the governor and most of his office did nothing wrong will not be the final word on this matter,” they said in a statement.
“The people of New Jersey need a full accounting of what happened. This review has deficiencies that raise questions about a lack of objectivity and thoroughness.
Dems also pointed out that Mastro, like Christie, is a former federal prosecutor. He was also chief of staff for Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, another former prosecutor who has staunchly defended Christie on talk shows since the scandal broke open in January.
Federal authorities also are investigating the lane closings and related allegations that two members of Christie’s Cabinet threatened to withhold Superstorm Sandy recovery aid to a flooded city unless its mayor OK’d a favored redevelopment project.
Five people close to Christie have lost their jobs in the wake of the scandal, including Kelly, whom he fired, and Stepien, who managed both of Christie’s gubernatorial campaigns and was said to be in line to run any presidential bid.
Emails already released during the investigation show that Stepien was aware of the lane closings while they were happening.
Christie maintains he knew nothing about the plot’s planning or execution, and found out about it later.
The review will be given to a special Legislative committee and the US Attorney’s office, which are investigating the scandal as well as the way Hurricane Sandy relief funds were used.
The report also finds that a claim by Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer that Christie’s administration told her that Superstorm Sandy relief funds would be tied to a private redevelopment plan was “demonstrably false.”