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 Christie is scheduled to attend a $1,000-per-ticket reception for
New Jersey Republican House candidate Steve Lonegan on Thursday. He
then will head to Florida for a series of weekend events aimed at
raising money for Republican Governor Rick Scott's re-election
campaign, plus a meeting with wealthy Republican donors from all
over the United States.
Interviews with a half-dozen Republican strategists, donors and
operatives indicate that if Christie is interested in a bid for the
White House, as many suspect, he has some work to do.
He needs to reassure big-money donors — even those who have seen him
as the party's best hope of winning the race to be Democratic
President Barack Obama's successor — that the scandal in which his
aides apparently created massive traffic jams to get back at a
Democratic politician in New Jersey will not grow enough to destroy
his prospects.
"Everyone is worried," Republican strategist Ford O'Connell said.
"But the donors are going to take a wait-and-see approach. They're
not cutting off the spigot yet."
The Florida events were planned before emails released last week
indicated that top Christie aides orchestrated lane closures last
September on a stretch of highway leading to the George Washington
Bridge, possibly to retaliate against the Democratic mayor of nearby
Fort Lee, New Jersey, who had declined to endorse him in last year's
gubernatorial elections.
Christie has said he did not know about his staff's role in the lane
closures before last week's revelations.
The traffic scandal heated up just as Christie's team was starting
to raise his profile as chairman of the Republican Governors
Association (RGA) and allow him to play a star-making role in
gathering money for candidates in the 2014 midterm elections. The
elections will decide 36 state governorships and control of the U.S.
Congress.
No individual candidate has publicly backed away from fundraising
with Christie, but Republican governors aside from Scott have
remained quiet about any plans to appear with him, in effect
distancing themselves from the "Bridgegate" scandal.
Many of Christie's most prominent financial backers have also been
largely silent since the scandal broke.
An exception has been Home Depot co-founder Ken Langone, who told
Politico that he approved of Christie's apologetic press conference
last week. On Wednesday, Langone told The Washington Post that
enthusiasm for Christie among major Republican donors "has never
wavered."
Other major backers of Christie, including New Jersey businessman
and philanthropist Woody Johnson, owner of the National Football
League's New York Jets, have mostly been silent.
Christie — who raised more than $12 million last year in easily
winning re-election in the mostly Democratic state — is regarded as
a powerful fundraiser, thanks in part to his ties to Wall Street as
a former lobbyist for the securities industry. A group of Republican
donors, including Langone, unsuccessfully tried to convince him to
run for president in 2012.
"Donors really like Chris Christie, especially Wall Street donors,"
Republican strategist and lobbyist John Feehery said.
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But if the state and federal investigations into the traffic scandal
gain momentum, some Republican donors will look to others to lead
the party's fundraising this year and to be contenders for the
presidential nomination, Feehery said.
"If it turns out he's a huge big liar" about not knowing about the
lane-closure plan in advance, "that's when they find somebody else"
to follow, he said.
STANDING BEHIND CHRISTIE
As chairman of the RGA, Christie was planning to tour the country
raising money and campaigning for several of the 22 Republican
governors up for re-election. It could give him a platform to
promote himself while gathering potential allies and donors for a
White House bid.
But one political casualty of the scandal was the staffer who was
expected to help turn Christie into a national fundraising dynamo.
Last week, Christie dismissed aide Bill Stepien from the RGA, where
Stepien was expected to assist in building a national network of
political and financial support. Stepien, Christie's former campaign
manager, had worked at the RGA for less than one month. Christie has
not announced a replacement.
RGA spokesman Jon Thompson said the group is standing behind
Christie.
"Governor Christie is a very effective fundraiser and leader for the
RGA and there's no doubt that will continue this year as we
aggressively focus on 36 gubernatorial elections," Thompson said.
Tim Pawlenty, a former Minnesota governor who briefly ran for the
Republican presidential nomination in 2012, played down fears that
the New Jersey scandal would seriously damage Christie, who is
well-liked by many in the party's establishment but viewed as not
conservative enough by many on the influential far-right wing of the
party.
"I know Chris Christie, and I would be astonished if there were any
evidence indicating he knew about these troubling events" in
advance, Pawlenty told Reuters. "I can't imagine that he would have
known and condoned these decisions and these actions."
Meanwhile, as Democrats in New Jersey's legislature are
investigating the traffic scandal, Democratic strategists are
watching for clues that the governor's relationship with Republican
donors has changed. "Donors are inherently risk-averse," said one Democratic strategist
with experience on two presidential campaigns. "When things are
going well, they're going really well. And when they're not going
well, they're nervous."
(Editing by David Lindsey, Martin Howell and Grant McCool)
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