New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. (photo: Carlo Allegri/Reuters)
28 March 14
If you believe an “emotional” and “stupid” jilted woman caused Bridgegate, I’ve got a bridge to sell you
ov. Chris Christie’s million-dollar taxpayer-funded self-exoneration in the Bridgegate scandal certainly found a bad guy — and it’s a gal.
Randy Mastro’s report put the blame squarely on two
fired staffers, David Wildstein and deputy chief of staff Bridget Kelly.
But its treatment of Kelly was mind-blowingly mean, describing her as
“emotional,” “erratic” and as a liar; confirming Trenton gossip that she
was “personally involved” with chief of staff Bill Stepien, and that
Stepien apparently dumped her; alleging that she asked an aide to delete
an incriminating email when the investigation began, thus implicating
her not only in the plot’s execution but its coverup.
It even recommended that Christie abolish the
department Kelly headed and fold it into another office. Mastro stopped
just short of suggesting the state torch Kelly’s office and salt the
earth it once stood on. That may be what Christie plans to announce at
his press conference this afternoon.
Christie’s lawyers’ treatment of Kelly was so shoddy
that Stepien, formerly the governor’s former right-hand man, was forced
to release a statement denouncing the report’s “gratuitous reference” to
his “brief” relationship with Kelly as “a regrettable distraction.”
Blaming the woman goes back to Eve, so it shouldn’t be
particularly surprising. But I still find this story bizarre: Why is
Christie so determined not only to blame his former allies, but to shame
them? He himself called Kelly “stupid” in his two-hour pity-party last
January, while he depicted Wildstein as a high-school loser to his
student-athlete-president demigod. Now his lawyers have used Stepien to
smear Kelly – and that’s pissed off not only Stepien but Kelly’s
friends, who took to the New York Times to denounce the report’s heaping dose of sexism in its depiction of Christie’s once fiercely loyal aide.
Mastro’s report maligns Kelly’s competence from the
beginning, noting that she was promoted to Stepien’s old job “though she
lacked Stepien’s expertise and background.” It even resorts to
inaccuracies to heap blame on Kelly, the New York Times reports,
accusing her of canceling meetings with Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop
after he declined to endorse Christie, when documents show others in the
administration canceled the meetings.
Mastro’s report has done the seemingly impossible: It
cost Christie the affection of the guys at “Morning Joe,” which has been
Christie’s clubhouse throughout the scandal. As Taylor Marsh details
(I missed it), Mark Halperin called the attacks on Kelly “sexist and
gratuitous,” while Scarborough compared Mastro to “Baghdad Bob.” Of
course, they’re still protecting Christie by blaming the sexism on
Mastro, when it’s unthinkable that the million-dollar report would have
dumped on Kelly without Christie’s say-so.
Knowing Christie’s M.O., if the Mastro report becomes a
new liability for him, he’ll probably throw the former prosecutor under
the bus with Kelly and Wildstein. But he won’t do it with the textbook
misogyny he broke out for Kelly. Christie is delusionally headed to Las
Vegas to kiss the ring of Sheldon Adelson at the Republican Jewish
Coalition meeting this weekend, still believing he has a chance to run
for president in 2016. Good luck courting the women’s vote, Gov.
Christie! Bridgegate is turning into Bridgetgate, another story about
Christie’s bullying sexism.
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