Bridgegate Motive: Mystery Solved

by sharman

This was the speculation on Steve Kornacki's show this morning. There is no question in my mind that he has put his finger squarely on it.

It is indeed, as the Mayor vaguely intuited, about Fort Lee's big crown jewel: The billion dollar redevelopment project at the foot of the bridge.

Some either wants a piece of that project, or wants to ratfuck it. Screw with the project's bridge access, and the project is dead.

Here are the dots that Kornacki connected:

1) The timing. Bridgegate went down just before major financing for the next phase of the project was to be secured. That financing did not get back on track til Bridgegate was called off.

2) Christie's initial dickish press conference: I'd noticed this too, but did not see the trail: Not only did Christie go out of his way to mock Fort Lee's pain, he gratuitously volunteered that the real scandal he sees--once Fort Lee and its bridge access came on his radar screen--was how the heck did that little pissant town get 3 bridge lanes. Said Christie, "That's what gets me sauced."

3) Kornacki played that clip, and this leaps out like a red flare: Christie goes on to say: "I've talked to Samson (head of the Port Authority and Christie's appointee) about (the travesty of Fort Lee having 3 lanes). I think that's something that should be looked at."

Neon lights, guys. That's absolutely what this is all about. The Samson connection is particularly telling--isn't he really juiced with major economic players? For him to control something as valuable and vital as access to the GWB, that's a gold mine.

So that is the motive. Stick a monkeywrench in the project, just in time to stall its financing. Make it clear that the Gov and his friends can take away your bridge access. Then someone gets something they want very much. Perhaps a piece of the project. Perhaps they want to kill the project, because it competes with another project.

And either way, I am sure Christie is in it up to his eyeballs.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/01/12/1269070/-Bridgegate-Motive-Mystery-Solved

“The fact is, I didn’t know Fort Lee got three dedicated lanes until all this stuff happened, and I think we should review that entire policy because I don’t know why Fort Lee needs three dedicated lanes to tell you the truth,” Christie said at the time. “And I didn’t even know it until this whole, you know, happening went about.”

http://www.northjersey.com/news/christie_kelly_bridge_lane_closures_emails.html?page=all

CHRISTIE: I didn`t know Fort Lee got three dedicated lanes until all this stuff happened. I sat in that traffic before I was governor, the fact that one town has three lanes dedicated to it? That kind of gets me sauced.

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/54031801/ns/msnbc-all_in_with_chris_hayes/

N.J. Lawmaker: New Docs Mention Christie Meeting With Port Authority Chair

The New Jersey lawmaker who's been leading the state assembly's investigation into the scandal surrounding lane closures on the George Washington Bridge said Friday that newly released documents raise further questions about the extent to which New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's (R) administration covered up the mess.

Assemblyman John Wisniewski (D) in a statement drew particular attention to a document showing an apparent meeting between Christie and one of his top appointees at the Port of New York and New Jersey, which oversees the bridge, just days before his deputy chief of staff wrote an email to a Port Authority executive saying it was "time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee."

Read Wisniewski's full statement below:

“As with so much else we’ve discovered during this investigation, these documents raise many more questions. It’s obvious that senior members of the governor’s staff were involved in spin control once this story broke.

“Given everything we’ve seen and heard, there are two glaring questions that exist right now.

“How much of the full picture was the governor’s senior staff given regarding the development of this lane closure project? With the tight control this administration maintains, it doesn’t stretch the imagination that they were given more information than they let on. When they were preparing spin control, how could they not have been given the whole story?

“Secondly, the documents submitted by David Wildstein and his attorney are documents they deemed specifically related to the lane closures at the George Washington Bridge as per our subpoena request. Included in these documents is a reference to what appears to be a meeting between Port Authority Chairman David Samson and the governor one week before Bridget Kelly issued the order to cause ‘traffic problems’ in Fort Lee. By submitting these documents, Mr. Wildstein is telling us they are related to the lane closures in some way. The question that demands answering is how?

“These are just two of the many answers we will be seeking in the days and weeks ahead.”

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/wisniewski_documents_new_questions