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Christie brushes off low polling numbers

by David McCabe - 05/01/15 7:21 PM ET

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a possible 2016 presidential candidate, said in an interview Friday he wasn’t concerned about falling polling numbers in his home state.

“Listen, these things go up and they go down. Right after I was re-elected, it was up in the high 60s,” he said during an appearance on Fox News’ “Special Report.” “You make hard decisions, and I’ve always been a proponent of saying when your popularity at its top, that’s when you make the hard decisions you have to make.”

“But in the end, if you do your job well, the numbers go back up,” he said.

{mosads}A majority of New Jersey voters now view their governor unfavorably, a Rutgers University Eagleton Institute of Politics poll found in February.

Christie said if he runs for president, it will be up to the voters to decide whether he can be president despite his bombastic personal style — but that he doesn’t plan to change his persona if he enters the race.

“I’m going to be who I am,” he said. “I tell them the truth as I see it, whether I think they’re going to like it or not. I am who I am, and if I decide to run for president, people will decide whether that’s something they want or don’t want in a president.”

Christie said he plans to announce whether he is running “sometime in June” — something he has essentially said in the past.

Friday was potentially bruising for Christie’s chances, with two former allies indicted and another pleading guilty on charges related to the 2013 closing for lanes on the George Washington Bridge — allegedly as an act of political retribution against the mayor of a nearby city who had declined to endorse the governor’s re-election bid.

Christie said Friday he believes the charges show that he was not involved in the closure.

Tags Chris Christie