Chris Christie

CRYAN: TIME TO HEAR REAL SOLUTIONS

(TRENTON) - Assemblyman Joseph Cryan (D-Union) released the following statement on Monday following Gov.-elect Chris Christie's news conference:

"Gov.-elect Christie gave few specifics in his campaign, and we're still getting the same political speak."

East Orange Mayor Robert Bowser (over Gov. Jon Corzine's left shoulder), and Essex County Executive Joe DiVincenzo, far right.

East Orange Mayor Robert Boswer today said he believes Chris Christie's victory over Jon Corzine in the governor's race earlier this month should spark Democratic Party senators to reconsider their abandonment of support for Senate President Richard Codey (D-Roseland).

"I don't know what to expect at all from Chris Christie, and probably won't get any kind of clues until the transition team changes the guard, but I do believe Christie's win changes the dynamic for the senate presidency and the same thing for the speaker of the assembly," said Bowser.

At last public count, Senate Majority Leader Steve Sweeney (D-West Deptford) has 15 caucus votes to Codey's eight heading into their Nov. 23rd Statehouse confab and presumptive legislative leadership change.

Newark Mayor Cory Booker on Election Day, 2008

Standing in the vanguard of opposing parties makes Gov.-elect Chris Christie and Newark Mayor Cory Booker obvious political adversaries - a relationship made more intriguing by their agreeable history and the crisis demands on both of them to deliver reforms in their respective spheres of power - but whatever the dynamics of their personal and professional relations, allies of both men expect a coming collision between Newark and New Jersey.

Don't count Booker among them.

"I know people want to turn this into a rivalry but when you consider the monumental challenges we are up against right now, he is my greatest ally," Booker said of Christie, the Republican who on Nov. 3rd defeated Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine. "To characterize us as rivals would be like saying Democrats and Republicans were the chief antagonists during World War II. We're in a crisis."

"I would also say - and I use this word because it is accurate - that Chris Christie is my friend. We have been friends for three years and he can assume credit for things we have accomplished here these past three years."

Booker knows the buzz about how he's the Democratic Party's most likely nominee for governor in 2013, to which he gives the only politic response: he's focused on the city's crime problem.

Prodded on politics and Christie, he adds, "I'm focused on next year's mayoral election and on electing the Booker Team (of council candidates)."

Assemblyman David Rible (R-Wall) today issued a statement indicating that he does not intend to pursue the office of Monmouth County Sheriff, which Kim Guadagno is vacating to assume the office of lieutenant governor.

"While I am honored that my name has been mentioned as a possible candidate for Monmouth County Sheriff, I have asked that my name be removed from consideration for this position," Rible said. "I am committed to devoting my time and energies to representing the residents of the 11th District. I look forward to serving in my new role as Assembly Republican Whip and working with Governor-elect Christie and the legislative leaders to offer change that the people of New Jersey deserve."

Former State Sen. Richard Bagger, who will head Gov.-elect Chris Christie's budget transition team, served as Assembly Appropriations Committee Chairman from 1998 to 2002

Two Democrats who served with former state Sen. Richard Bagger when he chaired the Assembly Appropriations Committee hailed him as a wise choice to co-chair Gov.-elect Chris Christie's transition task force on budget and taxes.

"What an impressive and talented guy," state Sen. Barbara Buono (D-Metuchen), chair of the senate budget committee, said of the legislator turned top Pfizer executive who Christie today named to the transition post along with venture capitalist Robert Grady.

"When he left it was a great loss to the New Jersey Legislature," Buono added of Bagger. "We're lucky to have him back. It says something about Chris Christie that he wound find someone that both parties hold in very high regard. And he's a nice guy on top of that. A real gentleman."

Former Assemblyman Bill Payne (D-Newark), older brother of U.S. Rep. Donald Payne (D-Newark), also praised Bagger.

Steve Adubato, center, with Gov-elect Chris Christie, right, and Gov. Jon Corzine, at the North Ward Center during the Republican Primary election earlier this year.

NEWARK - North Ward Democratic leader Steve Adubato hit back today against those critics in his party who bashed him for embracing Gov.-elect Chris Christie in the aftermath of the gubernatorial election at the charter school Adubato founded.

The Democrat singled out longtime political foe Senate President Richard Codey (D-Roseland), who Tuesday evening at West Ward Councilman Ron Rice's fundraiser griped that the party bosses dropped Gov. Jon Corzine "like a prom dress."

"First of all, the election's over, if we didn't come together we're going to play partisan roles and we all lose," Adubato told PolitickerNJ.com. "Codey knows that. Come on. He picked a Republican, Leonard Lance, to swear him in. What was Dick Codey saying then? He made a deal with the Republicans to hold onto his Senate Presidency to save his seat when Nia Gill challenged him. Stop.

"Tell Codey this is America. Teach him a lesson. We don't control who does what when they go into the booth and vote."

Gov.-elect Christopher Christie today announced a ten-person transition leadership team that includes legislators from both parties.  Former Attorney General David Samson had previously been designated as chairman of the transition panel.

The transition team includes: State Sens. Joseph Kyrillos (R-Middletown) and Sandra Bolden Cunningham (D-Jersey City),  Ocean County GOP Chairman George Gilmore, Christie campaign strategist Michael DuHaime, Woodbridge Mayor and former State Treasurer John McCormac, Montclair State University President Susan Cole, Southern New Jersey Chamber of Commerce President Debra DiLorenzo, former New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority Chairman Jon Hanson, and former PSE&G President Alfred Koeppe,

McCormac, a Democrat, did not endorse Christie during his campaign to unseat incumbent Jon Corzine, but did not actively campaign for Corzine.

“There is no doubt we have our work cut out for us, but I am confident that the team we have put together to lead my transition will set the tone for the rest of the Christie Administration,” Christie said in a statement released today.

Up for re-election next year, veteran Paterson Mayor Jose "Joey" Torres expects imminent contact with Republican Gov.-elect Chris Christie.

"Whether he initiates it or we do, at the end of the day we have to work together," Torres said. "If we shun each other, it will only get worse. We're going to have to have bipartisan support to get over the major hurdles of a financial crisis. The people have spoken.

"I've never looked for handouts, but have sought state aid to respond to definite needs in Paterson," added the mayor. "There is no pork barrel here."

Mayor for the past seven plus years, Torres is seeking a third term in 2010 and faces an emergent field of challengers, including Council President Jeffrey Jones and, potentially, At-Large Councilman Rigo Rodriguez and Ward 6 Councilman Andre Sayegh.

VERONA - Already state Senate Minority Leader Tom Kean, Jr.'s (R-Westfield) appointee to the congressional redistricting commission and more than a forward observer in the legislative redistricting process, state Sen. Kevin O'Toole (R-Cedar Grove) catapulted into a place where he can now speak candidly in the ears of power, both of the incoming governor and the incoming senate president, with Gov.-elect Chris Christie's victory last week and Senate Majority Leader Steve Sweeney's (D-West Deptford) imminent ascendency on Nov. 23rd.

It has been a slow turn-about and rapid ascent for a politician who on more than one occasion clung to what appeared to be the last shreds of his political career.

"When (James) Treffinger went down, it looked bleak," admittted the former chief of staff to the fallen Essex County executive. "2001 redistricting was bleak."

Elected to local government office in Cedar Grove at 25, the pugnacious political animal spent a career toiling as the dedicated minority in the engine room of the Democratic Party behemoth here in Essex, learning for the sake of survival how to nurture close ties to the other side even as he proudly hanged framed portraits of Ronald Reagan and Sean Hannity in his law office. 

He'd show up at an event in the North Ward, the guest of North Ward Democratic leader Steve Adubato. He had his friends there. There were high fives, for example, from Essex County Executive Joe DiVincenzo. But those Democrats not among Adubato's inner circle looked on O'Toole as an interloper, a castaway from the other party treading into enemy territory.

Assemblywoman Sheila Oliver (D-East Orange)

Her early critics quietly grumble that she's a political neophyte - the preferred Essex County term of art for someone who rises too quickly in politics.

But Assemblywoman Sheila Oliver (D-East Orange), a veteran of East Orange local politics, said she is more than ready to assume the lead role in the lower house come Nov. 23rd, when both the Assemby and the senate are scheduled to vote on leadership. 

Her rapid ascent coincides with the fast dimming political career of lame duck Gov. Jon Corzine.

"He genuinely wanted to effectuate glaring social issues of interest to a broad cross section to advocay groups, but did not understand the complexity of navigating the shark and barracuda filled waters of New Jersey politics," said Oliver when asked to reflect on Corzine's legacy.  

Poised with a sufficient number of caucus votes to become the Assembly's first African American woman speaker as succesor to Speaker Joe Roberts (D-Camden), Oliver said she received a phone call yesterday from Gov.-elect Chris Christie but was unavailable. She said she intends to return his call today.