New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie faces ads attacking him over liberal judges in his state when he arrives in New Hampshire on Thursday as he continues to rebuild his battered image with an eye on the White House.
The Judicial Crisis Network¸ a conservative advocacy group, has launched ads on TV and radio stations in the Granite State, as well as on digital media, claiming he’s broken his promise on appointing more conservatives judges to the Garden State’s Supreme Court, according to the
New Hampshire Journal.
The television ads launched Wednesday say, "New Jersey’s Supreme Court has been one of the most activist courts in the nation. Because of their lawless rulings, New Jerseys’ property taxes are the highest in the country.
"Chris Christie promised to change New Jersey’s liberal Supreme Court. Over and over, he broke his promise…the court remains liberal."
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This is the second set of ads that the JCN has targeted against Christie this month.
The organization previously launched a digital-only ad program in Iowa, which hosts the nation’s first presidential caucuses, when Christie visited the Hawkeye State. The JCN is spending $600,000 in New Hampshire for three days of ads compared to $75,000 in Iowa, says the Journal.
The New Hampshire ads urge viewers and listeners to log onto the website
www.ChristieBadOnJudges.com and sign a petition if they "want Christie to fight for judges who respect the rule of law."
Christie has appointed "liberal judges, despite his repeated promises to change the courts," the ads say, "On five separate occasions, Gov. Christie had the opportunity to build a new majority on the courts – a majority focused on the rule of law, and not judicial activism. Each time, he failed to do so.
"One Christie appointee – the chief justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court, Stuart Rabner – is so liberal that he was often mentioned as a potential Obama nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court. Rabner was first appointed to the court by the disgraced former Democrat governor, John Corzine."
The radio ads appear to take aim at Christie’s hopes of winning the GOP nod to become the party’s presidential candidate in 2016. "Important issues like Obamacare are at stake in our courts," it says. "The next president may get to appoint as many as three [U.S.] Supreme Court nominees."
The group’s policy director, Carrie Severino, slammed Christie’s picks of Rabner, Bruce Harris and Phillip Kwon to the New Jersey Supreme Court as examples of liberal judges, saying they have "no record of solid judicial philosophy," according to the Journal.
Although Christie’s aides have defended him by saying that the governor is tangling with a Democratic legislature, Severino said he has appeased the Democrats with his liberal choices.
Ostensibly, Christie is visiting New Hampshire for the second time in six weeks in his role as the chairman of the Republican Governors Association while helping to drive support for GOP gubernatorial candidate Walt Havenstein, a long shot to beat Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan in November.
But political pundits believe that Christie’s trip is likely also aimed at ingratiating himself in the first-in-the-nation primary state as he attempts to show that he’s still a contender to become the GOP presidential nominee in 2016.
Christie is attempting to bounce back after his presumed
presidential campaign hit a roadblock earlier this year over the scandal surrounding the traffic chaos on the George Washington Bridge, as well as the Garden State’s ailing pension system.