Obama in N.J. to talk about second chances, but he has none with Christie
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Version 0 of 1. NEWARK — The last time they were in the Garden State together, President Obama and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie merrily strolled the boardwalk in Asbury Park and even played an arcade game. On Monday, they were both back in New Jersey — but their public bromance is decidedly over. With Christie (R) desperate to rejuvenate a moribund 2016 presidential campaign, Obama has become a convenient political foil, never mind that three years ago they forged an unlikely cross-party alliance to respond to the devastation of Hurricane Sandy. So even before Obama touched down aboard Air Force One in Newark to highlight his administration’s efforts to help ex-offenders reenter society and find jobs after prison, Christie was denouncing the president’s appearance on his home turf. For good measure, the governor appeared at his own photo op in Camden to tout his administration’s efforts to reduce crime and rehabilitate convicts. “It’s great for the president to come and take credit for something he has nothing to do with,” Christie said during a morning appearance on “Fox & Friends,” citing a statewide drop in crime of 20 percent. “He wants to take credit for someplace that’s actually working, and, by the way, that’s happened in a state where what they know is the governor stands behind law enforcement.” White House aides chalked up Christie’s criticism to political desperation. Christie once touted his cross-party appeal as the Republican leader of a largely blue state, something that might widen the GOP’s appeal to moderates in a general election. But as he has struggled in the polls, the governor has veered to the right, hoping to impress conservative voters. Public opinion polls have showed the Christie campaign’s national support in the low single digits, well behind GOP front-runners Ben Carson and Donald Trump, both polling in the mid-20-percent mark. “I’ve noted before that Governor Christie’s comments in this regard are particularly irresponsible,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said, “but not surprising for someone whose poll numbers are closer to an asterisk than they are double digits. Clearly, this is part of a strategy to turn that around.” The Obama administration has focused on changes to criminal justice policy to help alleviate crowded prisons, and the president has commuted lengthy sentences for dozens of people convicted of nonviolent drug offenses. The president’s trip to Newark coincided with the early release of more than 6,000 federal prisoners on drug offenses as a result of policy changes made last year by the U.S. Sentencing Commission. After arriving in Newark, Obama toured Integrity House, a halfway house and drug treatment center, and met with a former offender. He also participated in a criminal justice roundtable at Rutgers University, where he announced a series of small-scale executive actions to ease the process. Among them were new federal education grants for community-based programs to help ex-offenders and new guidelines to delay inquiries into the criminal histories of applicants for federal jobs. Obama told a small audience at Rutgers that 2.2 million Americans are incarcerated. “A lot of time that record disqualifies you from being a full participant in our society, even if you’ve already paid your debt to society,” he said. “. . . So we’ve got to make sure Americans who paid their debt to society can earn their second chance.” The president was hardly hurting for suitors in Christie’s stead. Sen. Cory Booker (D), a former mayor of Newark, and the city’s current mayor, Ras Baraka (D), met the president on the tarmac as he debarked from Air Force One. Christie, after opting not to run for the White House in 2012 when some Republican Party leaders had courted him, has failed to gain traction for his campaign this year. He was damaged politically over a scandal in late 2013 when members of his administration ordered the closure of lanes of the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, snarling traffic, as political payback against a Democratic mayor. His critical tone against the Obama administration this year has contrasted with his stance in 2012 and 2013, when he sought to partner with the Obama administration to bring relief to New Jersey communities that had been devastated by Hurricane Sandy. Christie was criticized sharply by some Republicans after he embraced Obama in October 2012 during a tour of the damage and then praised the federal government’s response to the crisis. Some GOP leaders claimed that Christie’s appearance with Obama, just weeks before the 2012 election, helped the president demonstrate a bipartisan appeal to voters and boosted him in his reelection victory over Republican nominee Mitt Romney. Christie roundly rejected such suggestions, defending his actions as the right thing to do for his constituents. But in May 2013, Christie and Obama reprised their partnership as Christie ran for reelection. They celebrated the reopening of the boardwalk ahead of the Jersey Shore tourist season, pausing to inspect a sand castle and trying their hand at the Touchdown Fever football toss, where Christie won the president a stuffed bear by throwing the ball through a tire. During his interview Monday on “Fox & Friends,” however, Christie referred to recent comments from FBI Director James B. Comey, who suggested a link between the heightened scrutiny of police tactics and a spike in homicides in some cities, saying he believes some law enforcement agencies fear being accused of using excessive force. Christie said he stands behind police departments, “unlike this president, who does not support law enforcement and whose own FBI director is now saying ‘a chill wind is blowing through law enforcement’ because of the rhetoric of this president and his friends.” With a measure of irony, Earnest told reporters on Air Force One that criminal justice reform is one area where Obama hopes to find common ground with a GOP-controlled Congress in his final year in office. |