On the eve of his annual policy-setting speech Tuesday, Governor Chris Christie has largely given up trying to solve New Jersey’s mounting financial troubles. His focus now is on inspirational talks about addiction recovery.
In recent weeks, a videographer and audio technician have gathered footage as he visits rehabilitation centers and speaks about his late mother, a nicotine addict, and a law-school buddy hooked on prescription painkillers before his death. The issue won the Republican millions of social-media hits during his failed presidential campaign.
Now, after Christie hit a record-low approval rating and was snubbed by President-elect Donald Trump for an administration post, he has what may be his last opportunity to rehabilitate a take-charge image.
With a year left in his term, he’s up against a worsening pension-funding crisis, which has contributed to a record 10 credit-rating downgrades under his watch and for which he’s offered no recent solutions. Instead, he unsuccessfully pushed bills to let him profit from a book deal while in office and pull legal advertising from struggling newspapers.
“The political roads to Washington have been closed off to him,” said Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute in West Long Branch, New Jersey. “What kind of Christie are we going to get: the Christie of the past two years or the Christie that burst onto the scene in 2010?”
Unfinished Business
At a Jan. 4 bill-signing in Trenton to increase government financing for small businesses, Christie said that while “we have work to do” on the economy, he will maintain his focus on combating substance abuse. He declined to take questions from the press, as has been his practice since late September, as the George Washington Bridge traffic-jam trial unfolded.
“There will be lots of people who will write a lot of different things about what this year will be like, but none of them will write about it or talk about it with any sense of authority,” said Christie, 54.
Last year, New Jersey led the nation for residents relocating out of state, according to an annual United Van Lines Inc. study. Over the next 10 years, New Jersey’s employment growth is expected to be 4 percent, well short of the 10 percent forecast for the U.S., according to a study by the New Brunswick-based Rutgers University Economic Advisory Service. In 2017 alone, unemployment will reach 5.4 percent, against 4.9 percent last year.
“This could be a really dismal year or two ahead,” Michael Lahr, director of the service, said at a conference in November.