New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has defended returning to the campaign trail after a historic winter storm hit his state — but one local mayor says he’s been disrespectful of his home.
North Wildwood Mayor Patrick Rosenello, a Republican who has supported and spent time with Christie, lit into the governor Tuesday morning on local TV after Christie called him “crazy” at a campaign event in New Hampshire on Monday.
Speaking with Philadelphia’s Fox 29, Rosenello said he was a “big boy” who could take the name-calling, but said it was “disappointing” that Christie resorted to such language.
But he said the bigger issue was Christie’s apparent disregard for the damage suffered by his state.
“My biggest concern is complete and utter disrespect that he has shown to the first responders, the firemen, the police,” Rosenello said, citing dramatic video of first responders in waist-deep water and rescuing people from flooded cars. “For him to just completely disrespect the efforts that they put forth this past weekend, it’s unconscionable.”
Christie left the campaign trail Friday to be in New Jersey during the blizzard that hit much of the Mid-Atlantic region, but he returned to New Hampshire on Monday. Confronted by a voter as to why he wasn’t back in his state, he said there wasn’t much damage from it, and it was being handled.
“You want me to go down there with a mop?” he said.
“I heard one crazy mayor down in South Jersey say this is worse flooding than Sandy,” Christie added, referring to comments Rosenello made in the media. “Here’s the one thing you need to know about that mayor: His town didn’t get hit by Sandy. So of course it’s worse than Sandy for him.”
Christie called the mayor to apologize Tuesday morning, Rosenello and Christie confirmed.
Asked about the comments at a press conference in New Jersey, Christie said he didn’t place the call for the media’s benefit, but rather because he regretted what he said.
“He’s a long-time friend. I got carried away,” Christie said. “The reason for my apology was because I really felt badly about it. When I had a night to sleep on it and woke up this morning, I didn’t feel good about what I said about him.”
But, Christie added, “This was not even a fraction of Sandy.”
Rosenello told CNN he believed the apology was “genuine” and accepted it. He did not walk back any of his remarks on Fox 29 about the storm response.
Rosenello told Fox he did not appreciate the comments about the winter storm and noted that residents and business owners in his city are suffering immense damage.
“His lack of compassion is unbelievable,” the mayor said of Christie. “I’ve never seen anything like it, quite frankly, from an elected official.”
He added that it seemed that Christie made up his mind to ignore the storm from the start.
“I’ve been a big supporter for Gov. Christie. I supported his efforts after Hurricane Sandy,” Rosenello said. “It seems like he made a decision last Friday that this storm wasn’t going to be a big storm. Didn’t matter what happened.”