New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s political team had a plan to dole out flags that flew over the World Trade Center and other artifacts from the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks as favors in his presidential run.
The New York Times reported the scheme was revealed during the Bridgegate trial for two former Christie aides over whether they closed down lanes to the George Washington Bridge as retribution to a Democratic mayor who didn’t endorse the governor in his re-election campaign.
The revelation came from testimony from David Wildstein, a former Port Authority staffer who has admitted to coming up with the scheme to slow traffic on the bridge and tie up traffic in Fort Lee, New Jersey. Wildstein wrote to Christie’s deputy chief of staff, Bill Stepien, that flags that flew over the World Trade Center could be used as political props.
“Just to be clear, at some point hundreds of flags flown over the WTC will find their way to VFW’s all through Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina,” Wildstein wrote to Stepien in Sept. 2012, the Times reported.
In court, Wildstein testified that he meant those flags could help Christie during his presidential campaign. Stepien ran Christie’s gubernatorial re-election campaign and was expected to run his presidential campaign.
“I was conveying to Mr. Stepien that the flags that could be used to the governor’s political advantage in New Jersey could be used in those three states,” Wildstein said, according to the Times.
