On September 9, 2013 two of the three lanes of entry on the New Jersey side of the George Washington Bridge were closed, causing major traffic problems. The GWB is a major entry-point into New York City and the town of Fort Lee, NJ, was affected by all of the traffic.
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey claimed that the lane closures were part of a “traffic study,” but according to Elizabeth Titus of Politico, “Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich wondered if he ‘was being sent some sort of message.’”
It was then that a theory started to form; people began to wonder if the mayor was being punished for not endorsing republican Governor Chris Christie in his re-election campaign. Many other New Jersey democrats started to get involved in theorizing and the closures were looked at more closely. Christie was reelected in a landslide in November and the scandal was kept fairly quiet, until now.
The scandal has been dubbed “Bridgegate,” due to its similarities with the highly publicized Watergate scandal of the 1970’s. Nj.com has a very detailed timeline of the scandal. On December 2, Christie dismissed any speculation that the bridge closure was politically motivated. He joked at a news conference, “I worked the cones. Unbeknownst to anyone, I was working the cones." He was clearly implying that he had nothing to do with the lane closures. Just a few days after this, December 6, David Wildstein, a Port Authority official, resigned from his position at the Port Authority, saying that the controversy had “become a distraction, and I’m going to move on.”
Recently, on January 8, an email surfaced that had been sent by one of Christie’s Deputy Chiefs of Staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, to Wildstein, a month before the traffic jam. The email contained the following sentence, “Time to cause some traffic problems at Fort Lee,” to which Wildstein responded, “Got it.”
With the surfacing of this and other correspondences, Christie said he immediately fired Kelly along with another aid, Bill Stephen, who was also named in the messages. Christie, who had been mocking implications of this just a month before, said in a statement that he was misled by members of his staff and that he had no knowledge of the closures and called the situation “unacceptable.” Wildstein was subpoenaed to appear in front of state lawmakers who wanted him to testify. Rather than give out any information, he pleaded the Fifth for every question asked.
If a direct link is ever found between the governor and the lane closures, it could yield disastrous results for Christie’s political agenda. As of now, there is no direct link, but if Christie is somehow involved, it is likely that he will be found out. National news organizations are all over this and will continue to press to see if anything is revealed. Christie is a favorite for a potential Republican presidential nominee, and if a smoking gun is found, it could severely interrupt plans for Republicans who want to take back the White House.
Regardless of how this story develops, late-night comedians sure have plenty to talk about in their opening monologues this week. If you haven’t caught Jimmy Fallon and Bruce Springsteen’s rendition of “Born to Run” with lyrics regarding the bridge closure, I highly suggest it.
Sources:
http://www.politico.com/story/2014/01/chris-christies-bridgegate-guide-102033.html
http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2014/01/timeline_of_the_port_authoritys_george_washington_bridge_lane_closure_controversy.html
