On Presidential Campaign Trail, Christie to Visit Hub City

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ—New Jersey Governor and 2016 presidential candidate Chris Christie is set to hold a press conference at the Rutgers Chabad House on Tuesday, August 25, at 11 am.

The event marks the first time Christie will be making a public appearance in New Brunswick since he declared his candidacy for President, and his second appearance in the Hub City this year.

This year, the Governor has spent a majority of his time out-of-state in pursuit of his presidential aspirations.

While Christie’s travels beyond New Jersey have left the Lt. Governor Kim Guadagno as the Acting Governor, Christie has used communications tools like Skype and his smartphone to govern the state by remote control.

On August 10, NJ.com reported that the Governor already spent 121 days out-of-state this year at of August 10th, or five out of every nine days.

Most of that time was spent in Iowa, New Hampshire, key states in the Presidential primaries, and several television appearances and fundraisers across the Hudson River in New York City.  Christie’s tours have gone as long as four days at a time.

At the event on August 25, Christie says he will showcase his opposition to a non-proliferation treaty between the leaders of Iran and the United States, and urge Congress to reject it.

“Press Conference Urging Senator Cory Booker and Members of New Jersey Congressional Delegation to follow the example of Senator Robert Menendez and Oppose The Iran Deal,” the event title reads.

Mendendez held a press conference earlier this week at Seton Hall University to announce he would be voting against the deal, which will likely require support from two-thirds of US Senators.

In response, President Barack Obama authored an op-ed for NJ.com condemning Menendez, aruging that “strong diplomacy” had produced “an arrangement that permanently prohibits Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.”

Governor Christie will be accompanied by officials from nationwide rabbinical councils and pro-Israel lobbying groups. The Governor had previously spoken out against the Iran nuclear deal, saying that President Obama had “lied” to the American public. 

The announcement comes at a time where the Governor has reached his lowest popularity in public polls. A CNN/ORC International poll released on August 18 found Christie in 11th place among current Republican candidates for President.

Christie and his campaign team are probably hoping things will go more smoothly than the last time he appeared in the Hub City, more than two months before he joined the Presidential race.

In April, Christie appeared at the New Brunswick Counseling Center on Suydam Street, where he signed two bills into law and took questions from the New Jersey press corps for the first time in months. 

A small group of protestors gathered, but were soon forced off the property by the state police, who closed the gate and barred anyone else from gaining entry.

Members of the press turned their cameras onto the protestors, who were there in oppositon of Christie’s decision to send 150 state troopers to respond to protests and riots in Baltimore, Maryland, following the death of a man in police custody.

The chanting, along with trains traveling up and down the nearby Northeast Corridor railroad line, managed to drown out Governor Christie and overshadow the event.