Bridgegate

Extracted Attributes

• Location

  George Washington Bridge, Fort Lee, New Jersey, USA

• Official Name

  Fort Lee lane closure scandal

• Primary Allegation

  Political retribution via intentional traffic congestion

• Supreme Court Vote Count

  9-0 (Unanimous)

• Internal Investigation Firm

  Gibson Dunn & Crutcher

• Estimated Labor Cost of Fictitious Study

  5,400 USD

Timeline

• Lane closures begin on the George Washington Bridge, causing four days of gridlock in Fort Lee. (Source: SCOTUSblog)

  2013-09-09

• The law firm Gibson Dunn & Crutcher releases a 360-page report finding no evidence of Chris Christie's involvement. (Source: Ballotpedia)

  2014-03-27

• David Wildstein pleads guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud and conspiracy against civil rights. (Source: Ballotpedia)

  2015-01-12

• Bridget Kelly and Bill Baroni are charged with nine counts including conspiracy to commit fraud. (Source: Ballotpedia)

  2015-04-01

• The federal trial for Kelly and Baroni begins in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. (Source: Ballotpedia)

  2016-09-19

• The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously throws out the fraud convictions of Kelly and Baroni. (Source: CNN)

  2020-05-07

• Chris Christie addresses and dismisses the Bridgegate controversy during an interview on the All-In Podcast. (Source: Document 5b586118-9bc8-4350-a309-3cd1b50c9631)

  2023-01-01

Bridgegate

Bridgegate may refer to: Bridgegate, Chester, part of the city walls of Chester, Cheshire, England Fort Lee lane closure scandal, a political scandal involving a staff member and political appointees of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie

Web Search Results

• Lane closure investigation in Fort Lee, New Jersey ("Bridgegate")

  In April 2015, Kelly and Bill Baroni, the former deputy executive director of the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey, were each charged with nine counts, including conspiracy to commit fraud. Baroni and Kelly pleaded not guilty to all charges; however, Wildstein corroborated the charges against them, claiming that the three of them had collaborated in the bridge closing scheme. In May 2015, Judge Susan Wigenton pushed the start date of the trial from July 7, 2015, to November 6, 2015. The trial was later postponed again and began on September 19, 2016. Christie stated in August 2016 that he would testify if subpoenaed and told reporters he was confident he would be absolved of any wrongdoing. [...] On January 12, 2015, Wildstein pleaded guilty in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey in Newark to charges of conspiracy to commit fraud and “conspiracy against civil rights.” Each count against Wildstein carries a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison. [...] Christie's administration hired the law firm of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher to investigate the lane closures. The firm released a 360-page report on March 27, 2014, and said that they could not find evidence that implicated Christie in the controversy. An employee at the firm, attorney Rando Mastro, said that the firm's ten-week review showed that Christie "had no knowledge beforehand of this George Washington Bridge realignment idea and that he played no role whatsoever in that decision or the implementation of it." In response to critics of the idea that Wildstein and Kelly had acted alone, Christie told ABC News: "Sometimes people do inexplicably stupid things, and so that's what makes it so hard then as the guy in charge - none of it made any sense to me, and to some extent still does

• Bridgegate scandal: Supreme Court throws out convictions of New ...

  01:37 Now playing • Source: CNN Video Ad Feedback Tracking the US military buildup near Iran 02:03 Now playing • Source: CNN CNN — The Supreme Court threw out fraud convictions on Thursday against two New Jersey officials involved in the “Bridgegate” political scandal, the George Washington Bridge traffic jam that rocked the administration of then-Gov. Chris Christie. Writing for a unanimous court, Justice Elena Kagan said that “for no reason” other than “political payback” the aides “used deception” to cut access lanes from Fort Lee, New Jersey, to the bridge. The move “jeopardized the safety of the town’s residents,” Kagan wrote, but concluded that “not every corrupt act by state or local officials is a federal crime.” [...] Traffic moves over the Hudson River and across the George Washington Bridge between New York City (R), and in Fort Lee, New Jersey on December 17, 2013. New Jersey's Republican Governor Chris Christie has had to fend off allegations in a scandal involving the bridge. In September, two of Christie's top appointees at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey ordered the lanes on the bridge shut to traffic, causing days of gridlock in Fort Lee, New Jersey. Some Democrats have said that the move was political revenge against the town's mayor, Democrat Mark Sokolich, for not endorsing Christie for reelection. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images) John Moore/Getty Images Related article READ: Supreme Court's ruling on 'Bridgegate' [...] “Congratulations to former Governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie, and all others involved, on a complete and total exoneration (with a 9-0 vote by the U.S. Supreme Court) on the Obama DOJ Scam referred to as ‘Bridgegate,’” the President tweeted. Baroni’s lawyer, Michael Levy, said in a statement to CNN that his client is “heartened” by the decision from the justices. “Although the process of getting to this day has been an ordeal, Bill is heartened that the system ultimately worked, even as he recognizes how often it fails others who are less fortunate. At long last, Bill looks forward to moving on from this case and continuing his life of service,” Levy said. Mark Coyne, the attorney representing the United States, said the decision on Thursday “speaks for itself.”

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• Opinion analysis: Unanimous court throws out "Bridgegate ...

  In 2013, officials with ties to Chris Christie, then the governor of New Jersey, altered the traffic pattern on the George Washington Bridge in an effort to punish the mayor of nearby Fort Lee, New Jersey, for his failure to support Christie’s reelection bid. The change in the traffic pattern led to four days of gridlock on the streets surrounding the bridge before the original pattern was eventually restored. Two of the officials responsible for the change were found guilty of violating federal statutes prohibiting wire fraud and fraud from federally funded programs. But today the Supreme Court threw out those convictions. In a unanimous decision by Justice Elena Kagan, the court ruled that although the officials’ actions were an “abuse of power,” they did not violate the federal fraud [...] The defendants in the case were Bridget Kelly, Christie’s deputy chief of staff, and William Baroni, whom Christie had named as the deputy executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the bridge. For many years, three of the 12 toll lanes on the upper deck of the bridge going from New Jersey into New York have been cordoned off with traffic cones during the morning rush hour, so that local traffic from Fort Lee can cross the bridge more easily. After Mark Sokolich, the mayor of Fort Lee, declined to endorse Christie in 2013, Baroni and Kelly – along with David Wildstein, a Port Authority staffer – decided to retaliate against Sokolich by reducing the number of lanes reserved for Fort Lee drivers to one. They made the change on the first day of school [...] Kelly and Baroni were sentenced to 18 months in prison, although Kelly’s sentence was later reduced to 13 months. A federal appeals court upheld their convictions, agreeing with the government that the requirements of the fraud statutes had been met. Kelly and Baroni had engaged in deception when they lied about the traffic study to justify the change to the toll lanes, the court reasoned, and those lies deprived the Port Authority of its property – both its right to control the bridge lanes and the cost (approximately $5,400 to have an extra toll collector standing by and for traffic engineers to conduct the fictitious traffic study) of the otherwise unnecessary labor of its employees. The Supreme Court agreed to review the case last year and heard argument in January.

• Fort Lee lane closure scandal - Wikipedia

  Those news organizations together asked the court to release the prosecution's list of unindicted co-conspirators. On February 17, 2016, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman's office filed a brief to Wigenton requesting that the Bridgegate records remain sealed so that the list of uncharged third-party co-conspirators not be made public. Co-conspirators refers to "individuals the government believes may have known about the plot to abruptly shut down access lanes to the bridge to cause massive traffic disruptions, but were not charged". Fishman claimed that it was a policy of the United States Department of Justice "to avoid unnecessary public references to wrongdoing" by unindicted co-conspirator because they have no "evidentiary value" in the criminal matter. If the names were made public, [...] The U.S. Attorney, whose office did not identify who was being served, began an official investigation and issued grand jury subpoenas for documents related to the Bridgegate scandal to various people and entities. Mark Sheridan, a partner with Patton Boggs, which had been retained to represent Christie's 2013 re-election campaign organization and the New Jersey Republican State Committee in connection with investigations into this scandal, said on January 23, 2014, that both organizations had received subpoenas. On February 3, Christie said that his governor's office received a subpoena. The Federal Bureau of Investigation assisted the U.S. Attorney in its investigation.