March 28, 2024

New Jersey’s Chris Christie Enjoys Closed Beach after Government Shuts it Down


FILE PHOTO: New Jersey Governor Chris Christie reacts to a question during a news conference in Trenton, New Jersey, U.S. on March 28, 2014. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz/File Photo


By Elinor Comlay / 07.03.2017

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was caught on camera taking time out from dealing with a government shutdown to sunbathe on a state beach that had been closed to the public during the July Fourth holiday weekend, angering some residents.

A New Jersey newspaper captured photos of the Republican governor and his family as they enjoyed the empty beach on Sunday, just hours before he donned a suit and tie and boarded a helicopter to fly to Trenton, the state capital, to discuss stalled shutdown negotiations with reporters.

Christie, already the least popular governor in modern New Jersey history before the photos were published, was unrepentant during a phone call to a morning TV show on Monday. When the host said he could understand why people were upset Christie was on a beach closed to the public, Christie responded, “Well, I’m sorry, they’re not the governor,” referring to the governor’s residence at the state park.

Budget impasses have caused partial government shutdowns in New Jersey and in Maine, leading to the suspension of many nonessential services.

New Jersey’s state parks closed on Saturday, forcing many to alter their holiday weekend plans. More than 30,000 state workers were on furlough on Monday.

In Maine, the state police, parks and offices responsible for collecting revenue all planned to work through the shutdown, the state’s first since 1991. But the majority of its 12,000 state employees will be furloughed.

Members of Maine’s State Employees Association rallied outside the State House on Monday to demand a budget deal from lawmakers and Republican Governor Paul LePage.

“Governor LePage won’t answer his door – we want to work!” organizers posted on Twitter, with photos and videos of dozens of the association’s members holding placards and chanting.

‘BEYOND WORDS’

Christie, a former Republican presidential candidate who is in the last year of his second and final term running the state, had been staying with his family at the governor’s residence at Island Beach State Park.

Lieutenant Governor Kim Guadagno, who hopes to succeed him, was among many who took to social media on Monday to criticize his quiet time on the dunes.

“It’s beyond words,” Guadagno tweeted. “If I were gov, sure wouldn’t be sitting on beach if taxpayers didn’t have access to state beaches.” Guadagno is also a Republican.

Many agreed the move was tone-deaf, with one typical headline in local news media reading: “Christie is blistered over his day at the beach.”

Christie is fighting New Jersey lawmakers over a controversial bill that he says must be passed alongside the state’s budget.

The budget itself has been passed by committees in both houses, but Christie says he will strike out hundreds of millions of dollars in funding for schools and other key services if the Democrat-led Assembly does not vote on a separate bill to restructure the state’s largest health insurer.

That threat was enough to prevent Democratic Assembly Speaker Vincent Prieto from getting enough votes to pass the budget on Friday, triggering the shutdown. All 80 members of New Jersey’s Assembly are up for re-election in November.

Prieto left the vote open over the weekend, and one vote switched from “abstain” to “yes”, but the Assembly is still 13 short of the votes needed to pass the budget.

Christie said at a news conference on Sunday that he was open to hearing other proposals from Democrats but he expected the shutdown would likely continue through the July Fourth holiday.

At that same news conference, before the photos were published, Christie said he did not get any sun this weekend. His spokesman later clarified that was because the governor was wearing a baseball hat.

(Reporting by Elinor Comlay; Additional reporting by Gina Cherelus in New York; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Jonathan Oatis)