By Michael Aron
Chief Political Correspondent
After the governor’s endorsement of Donald Trump on Friday, Christie’s confidante Bill Palatucci, who was with him in Fort Worth, held a conference call with all 21 Republican county chairmen invited.
Palatucci asked them to get on board with the governor and support Trump.
NJTV News has learned some of them are having trouble doing that.
Bergen County GOP Chairman Bob Yudin, for example, a Vietnam-era veteran says, “Trump’s remarks about John McCain and POWs have me really hesitating.”
“Initially, it seems to have something of a divisive impact,” former press secretary Carl Golden said.
Golden says New Jersey Republicans are just not going to all fall in line.
“I think there are just some people who consider Donald Trump, for a variety of reasons, not to be presidential material,” he said.
Republican state Sen. Kevin O’Toole has his own take on what appears to be division in the party.
“Well, it’s interesting because if you read the reporters from a few years ago, we’re all lemmings who just want to jump when the governor says jump and we say how high. Now I’m reading we’re divided. It’s a natural process. He’s the titular head of the Republican Party in the state of New Jersey. Many of us were deferential recognizing his position as the governor,” O’Toole said.
Christie looked distracted and tired at a Newark event last week, his only scheduled event since Feb. 16.
Then with Trump in Texas he looked animated.
The endorsement put him back on the national stage and back on at least one Sunday talk show.
“We all know that Christie very much enjoys the whole political slash campaign environment, more so at this point in his term than he enjoys governing,” Golden said.
Golden says Christie jumped on the Trump train before it left the station and will reap the fruits of that, and being governor could take a back seat.
“I think he will do what he’s constitutionally required to do, but I don’t think he’s about to take on many new initiatives or engage the Legislature in the kind of combat we’ve seen the past five to six years,” he said.
Democrats in the Legislature reacted to the endorsement as you might expect.
“This probably means the governor continues on his vacation from being the governor of New Jersey,” said Sen. Bob Smith.
“Well, the governor has proven once and for all he has no principles, no values and that the only person he cares about is himself,” said Sen. Ray Lesniak.
Christie’s Republican allies defend the endorsement.
“Do I think it’s dividing? We’re having a healthy discussion. A lot of the county committee members are deciding what they’ll do. My guess is the majority of folks will go with the Trump endorsement,” O’Toole said. Will he? “I will,” he said.
The media have had a field day contrasting what Christie said about Trump during the campaign and what Christie is saying now. The governor told George Stephanopoulos yesterday, you don’t have to agree with everything Trump says to endorse the guy.
“I ran against the guy so of course there are things I disagree with him on,” Christie said on “This Week”.