NEW YORK, (Reuters) – The New Jersey mayor who added to Governor Chris Christie’s woes with fresh claims that his office punishes uncooperative local officials stuck to her story yesterday, overshadowing the governor’s fundraising trip in Florida.
Widely seen as a Republican contender for the White House in 2016, Christie avoided mention of his troubles at home while he raises funds on a closely watched trip to Florida this weekend.
His office dismissed as false claims by Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer that he sent his deputy to tell her she risked not getting requested funds for Superstorm Sandy relief unless she backed a redevelopment project in her city.
But Zimmer stuck to her story yesterday that two state officials, including Lieutenant Governor Kim Guadagno, told her Christie would withhold funding if Zimmer did not support a bid by the New York-based Rockefeller Group to build on several blocks in the city.
“She came and made a direct threat to me,” Zimmer told CNN television, describing a conversation she had with Guadagno in a parking lot shortly before an event in Hoboken in May. “I’m offering to testify under oath.”
Zimmer says she has only received a fraction of the $127 million in relief funds she requested for Hoboken, a city just across the Hudson River from Manhattan that was badly flooded by Sandy in late 2012.
“The lieutenant governor said, essentially: ‘You’ve got to move forward with the Rockefeller project,’” Zimmer said yesterday. “She said this is a direct message from the governor: ‘I was with him on Friday night.’”
Zimmer said later on Sunday in a statement released to the media that she had met for several hours with members of the U.S. Attorney’s office in Newark.
“This afternoon I met with the U.S. Attorney’s office for several hours at their request and provided them with my journal and other documents,” Zimmer said in the statement provided to local New Jersey media and other outlets.
“As they pursue this investigation, I will provide any requested information and testify under oath about the facts of what happened when the Lieutenant Governor came to Hoboken and told me that Sandy aid would be contingent on moving forward with a private development project,” she said in the statement.
Christie is in Florida this weekend to raise money for Republican Governor Rick Scott, on a trip viewed as a test of donor confidence in a potential presidential bid in 2016.
It is his first political trip since his office was engulfed by scandal this month after it emerged that some of his closest aides orchestrated chaotic traffic jams in the city of Fort Lee by closing lanes on the busy George Washington Bridge linking New Jersey and New York City.
