Christie on MSNBC slams network for its Bridgegate coverage

Gov. Chris Christie (R-N.J.) slammed MSNBC during an appearance on the network’s “Morning Joe” program Tuesday over its coverage of the Bridgegate controversy.

“Did you ever expect that bridge story when it first hit to expand the way it did?” asked co-host Joe Scarborough. 

“No. I can’t thank your network enough for that, too,” Christie said. “Your network made a cottage industry for about three months on that. ‘Rachel Maddow, an hour special on this secretary to Governor Christie.’”

{mosads}“Can I just say our prime time thanks you as well?” Scarborough responded. 

“I’m sure they did. We put them on the map,” Christie noted. 

“This is a little awkward,” injected co-host Mika Brzezinski.

“No, listen, it’s not awkward,” Christie said. 

“I love awkward,” Brzezinski replied. 

“You know why it’s not awkward?” Christie continued. 

“It’s not awkward because I knew then, and I know now, that I didn’t do anything wrong, and all that came out in the long run, and all the people yelling and screaming at the time that I did something wrong, I knew they were wrong. You just have to wait history out. That’s what I did.” 

In the Bridgegate scandal, aides to Christie shut down lanes on the George Washington Bridge in an act of political retribution against a local mayor who had refused to endorse Christie’s reelection bid.

Two of Christie’s former aides were charged in connection with the scandal. But in January, prosecutors decided not to press charges against Christie, saying they could not prove he had knowledge of the lane closures.

MSNBC, and particularly Maddow, covered Bridgegate extensively from January of 2014 through the spring of that year.

Christie was reelected in 2013 with 61 percent of the vote in the reliably blue state of New Jersey. But after Bridgegate, his approval rating went downward.

He is now at 16 percent approval, according to an Aug. 31 Rutgers University poll.