The soundbites are being lobbed back and forth in New Jersey.
A leading state Republican on Friday responded to a Democrat’s call for Gov. Chris Christie (R) to resign by saying the assemblywoman must have “caught the MSNBC fever” when she made the comments on the cable news channel.
“Assemblywoman Watson Coleman caught the MSNBC fever,” Assembly Minority Leader Jon Bramnick (R) said in a statement, according to The Newark Star-Ledger. “Her call for the governor to resign may be what MSNBC wants to hear but not the people in the State of New Jersey.”
Bramnick’s statement came the morning after Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson Coleman (D), a member of the legislative committee investigating the George Washington Bridge lane closures, said on Rev. Al Sharpton’s MSNBC show that Christie should consider resigning over the scandal.
“The governor needs to think about resigning, and he needs to take all his friends with him because this is sickening,” Watson Coleman said.
Watson Coleman was talking about the latest documents that have come to light in connection with the lane closures, which showed former close allies of the governor joking about creating “traffic problems” in front of the house of a New Jersey rabbi.
“And this really is what they’re all about, transactional deals, dismissiveness, remarks that are totally, totally unacceptable in a civilized society,” Watson Coleman said.
According to the Star-Ledger, Sharpton asked Watson Coleman why Christie should resign in the absence of an direct tie between him and the plan to close the lanes on the George Washington Bridge.
“Because he is responsible for everybody that is in the middle of all of this mess, not just this — this is irrespective of just bridgegate,” she said. “This is all the stuff that we’re hearing about all the transactions that are taking place. This is abusiveness. This is bullying. This is disrespectfulness. That’s the way he has been governing. And the one connecting theme here is that he has hired or caused the hiring of each and every one of them. I’m not saying he has done anything illegal. I’m saying it’s unethical and it is not worthy of New Jersey’s citizens.”
