A federal prosecutor told jurors Monday that a witness will testify that Republican Gov. Chris Christie was told about a plan to close traffic lanes near the George Washington Bridge as the shutdown was happening, a claim he has contested for years.
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Prosecutors have made it clear that Christie had far more substantial knowledge of the incident than was previously thought.
Christie specifically knew that the lane closures were meant to punish Sokolich for not endorsing his re-election campaign for governor, prosecutors asserted.
According to a 2015 indictment, former Christie deputy chief of staff Bridget Kelly and former bridge authority executive Bill Baroni schemed in September 2013 with another Port Authority official, David Wildstein, to reduce bridge access lanes in the town of Fort Lee to punish the town’s mayor for not endorsing Christie.
Baroni and Kelly will take the stand in their own defense.
The defense claimed Wildstein was Christie’s main voice at the Port Authority of NY and New Jersey – a former blogger who had files on every politician, nicknamed “the Enforcer”. Wildstein responded: “Got it”.
The assertion came during the “Bridgegate” trial of two of Christie’s former aides, whom prosecutors accuse of hatching a plan to create a mammoth traffic jam on the George Washington Bridge to retaliate against Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich for not supporting Christie’s reelection bid.
In the government’s opening, Khanna described how crushing gridlock engulfed Fort Lee on four days beginning September 9, 2013, and how the defendants ignored Sokolich’s texts, emails and voicemails seeking help.
Andrew Burton/Getty Images News/Getty ImagesFORT LEE, NJ – JANUARY 09: The New Jersey side of the George Washington Bridge, which connects Fort Lee, NJ, and New York City, is seen on January 9, 2014 in Fort Lee, New Jersey. He pleaded guilty last year and faces up to 15 years in prison but is cooperating the government, which is likely to reduce his sentence.
The defense also dragged Christie into the scheme by noting that Wildstein was well known as the governor’s yes-man “fixer”.
The aides’ lawyers have also said Christie knew what his allies were doing, which Christie denied repeatedly.
And much like Baroni’s attorney argued prosecutors’ chief witness – Baroni’s second in command at the Port Authority – couldn’t be trusted, Critchley echoed those remarks. Two months after the closures, Baroni told a legislative hearing the realignment was part of a traffic study.
Christie has insisted that he never knew about the bush-league political plot beforehand – and didn’t remember ever being told about the closures when they occurred.
According to attorney Michael Critchley, Kelly’s role in the Christie administration mainly revolved around logistics and scheduling. Critchley displayed a chart in the courtroom with Christie at the center, titled “Inner Circle”.
Defense attorneys spent considerable time in their opening statements castigating Wildstein, a former political blogger and high school classmate of Christie who they called the governor’s hatchet man at the Port Authority.
Baldassare did not offer details of Baroni’s work for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but he said the evidence Baroni provided was always corroborated.
“Chris Christie gave this man power”, Critchley said. To defeat an opponent in an early political race, Wildstein offered to drop the candidate’s nominating petitions at the elections office – but then he threw them in the trash. The organization is the Port Authority of NY and New Jersey, which runs area bridges, tunnels and transit hubs and where Baroni served as deputy executive director.
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This is all a reference to a conversation in which two individuals involved in closing the bridge lanes say they brought this up during a 9/11 ceremony when they spoke to Gov. Christie.
