Chris Christie is the only Republican presidential candidate pledging not to fire FBI Director Christopher Wray, who served as the former New Jersey governor’s lawyer during the “Bridgegate” scandal and may have possessed key evidence in the case that was never seen.
Christie, 60, said during a CNN town hall earlier this month that he would keep Wray in his administration if elected — having recommended his nomination to Donald Trump in 2017 — but said nothing about the FBI director’s former role as his attorney.
“If he wanted to stay, I would keep him. And I would hold him to the very same standard that I just talked about. And I would give him a boss, as attorney general, who he would know he had to report to and that he’d have to answer for everything that’s going on in the FBI,” the two-term governor said. “And, by the way, no matter how well I know him or that I have recommended him, if I thought for a second that he stepped out of line and did something that was unjust, I’d fire him.”
Wray, who worked as a partner at King & Spalding from 2005 to 2016, represented Christie over his alleged involvement in politically motivated lane closures on the George Washington Bridge that snarled traffic in September 2013.
Three of Christie’s aides — deputy chief of staff Bridget Anne Kelly and Port Authority officials David Wildstein and Bill Baroni — were federally indicted for orchestrating the lane closures.
Kelly and Baroni testified that the governor was aware of the scheme, but Christie has denied any involvement.
The move was apparently retaliation against Democratic Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich, who refused to endorse Christie’s successful re-election campaign.
Attorneys for the aides argued as the case went to trial in 2016 that the governor’s cell phone contained unseen text messages that could shed new light.
Phone records obtained by the New Jersey legislature two years earlier show that Christie texted back and forth with his chief of staff during the first legislative hearing on Bridgegate, according to WNYC.
A Newark federal judge halted defense lawyers’ attempts to obtain the phone, even after they threatened Wray and the governor’s other lawyers with subpoenas, The New York Times reported.
“The harder they fight to not let us see it, the more I think is on it,” Michael Baldassare, an attorney for Baroni, told the outlet in July 2016. “I think it’s more likely I will be dead of old age before anybody willingly lets me see the governor’s cellphone.”
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A spokesman for the governor later confirmed to the Times that Christie no longer had his phone and had handed it over to his lawyer. But Wray never responded to the outlet when asked whether he had it.
Wildstein pleaded guilty to conspiracy the same month, while Baroni and Kelly were convicted in November 2016. Kelly has maintained she was made a scapegoat for Christie after having authored an email that read, “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.”
The US Supreme Court overturned the Bridgegate convictions in May 2020, finding that federal wire fraud laws were not violated since money was not involved in the scandal.
The Bridgegate fiasco likely contributed to a poor showing for Christie in the 2016 Republican primary, and he was also passed over for Trump’s running mate in favor of Mike Pence, as well as for the post of attorney general in favor of then-Sen. Jeff Sessions.
Christie is seeking the Republican nomination again in 2024 but his views on Wray make him an outlier in the field.
Former President Donald Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Pence, former Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy have all promised voters that they will fire Wray if they win the White House.
North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and Miami Mayor Francis Suarez have told The Daily Caller that they were open to firing the FBI director, while former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson declined to commit to making a change at the top of the bureau, but promised “reforms.”
Christie got to know Wray at the Justice Department while serving as the US Attorney for New Jersey. Wray served as assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s criminal division from 2003 to 2005.
The former governor is currently pulling 2.3% support, according to the RealClearPolitics average, behind Trump (52.2%), DeSantis (21.4%), Pence (5.7%), Haley (3.6%) and Scott (3.5%).
The Christie campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
