Bridgegate: ‘No proof’ against NJ Gov Christie

WASHINGTON DC, USA – An official probing orchestrated traffic jams on a major US bridge said Sunday, February 2, he had seen no proof Governor Chris Christie ordered lane closures that hurt his White House hope.

Seen as a potential Republican flagbearer for the 2016 US presidential race, Christie has been on the defensive since it emerged his office was tied to bottlenecks on the George Washington Bridge last September.

The jams, which brought misery to commuters for several days, were apparently caused by senior local officials to punish a mayor who refused to endorse New Jersey Governor Christie’s successful re-election bid.

“We don’t have any proof right now that the governor said ‘go and close the lanes,'” Democratic assemblyman John Wisniewski, who heads the state legislature’s probe of the matter, told broadcaster NBC.

“We don’t have any proof. We need more proof,” he said in an interview on Sunday morning talk show “Meet the Press.”

His comments came in the wake of a claim that Christie knew more than he has admitted about the plot.

On the former Port Authority official who oversaw the lane closures claimed that the order to close access lanes to the bridge came from the Christie administration.

David Wildstein, who has known Christie since high school, also said that the governor was aware of the lane closures as they took place and caused traffic chaos.

Wisniewski, in his interview with NBC, said Wildstein’s allegation was not backed up in more than 900 pages of documents he submitted in response to a subpoena.

When asked if nothing in the documents implicated Christie, Wisniewski responded: “Nothing that says the governor knew contemporaneously.”

But, he added: “I have a lot of questions about what the governor said and what Mr. Wildstein is saying.”

The George Washington Bridge, which spans the Hudson River and connects New Jersey and New York City, is a key route for many tens of thousands of commuters. – Rappler.com