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Pence In, Christie Out As Trump Shakes Up Transition Team

Pence In, Christie Out As Trump Shakes Up Transition Team

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) – President-elect Donald Trump put vice presidential running mate Mike Pence in charge of his White House transition team on Friday, knocking New Jersey Governor Chris Christie down a peg as he began the work of filling top administration jobs.

Christie will remain as a vice chair of the transition effort, Trump’s campaign said, as he deals with the fallout from the ‘Bridgegate’ lane closure scandal that has damaged his political standing.

The announcement came shortly after Trump aides convened at the real-estate mogul’s apartment building in New York City to begin weighing candidates for some of the 4,000 jobs he will have to fill shortly after he takes office on Jan. 20, 2017.

Trump said three of his five children and his son-in-law Jared Kushner would help oversee the transition.

“I can see already how he is going to be a great president and I’m glad I could play a small role in it,” former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani told reporters after the meeting.

Giuliani is the leading contender for attorney general, according to two sources familiar with the discussions. Christie, once a top candidate for the job, appears to no longer be in the running, they said.

Since his surprise defeat of Democratic rival Hillary Clinton in Tuesday’s election, dozens of possible appointees have been floated, from grassroots conservative heroes like Sarah Palin to seasoned Washington hands like David Malpass.

Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus is a strong candidate for White House chief of staff, according to sources close to the campaign. Trump campaign CEO Steve Bannon, a conservative provocateur, is also being considered for the job.

SMALL POOL

Trump has a relatively small pool of candidates to work with, as many Republicans condemned his racially inflammatory rhetoric over the course of the campaign and some of his positions, such as his attacks on free trade, run against party orthodoxy.

Trump’s campaign spent relatively little time on transition planning during the campaign, and even his Republican supporters had been bracing for a loss.

“I was on Romney’s transition team, and it was a well-oiled machine months before the election. Now there’s a scramble,” said one Republican source, referring to the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, Mitt Romney.

With a Republican-controlled House and Senate, Trump has the ability to follow through on his campaign promises to cut taxes, tighten immigration, scale back climate change rules and repeal President Barack Obama’s signature Affordable Care Act, popularly known as Obamacare.

An Obama administration rule requiring retirement advisers to act in their clients’ interests could also be on the chopping block.

But House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan and other congressional Republicans may balk at his protectionist trade policies and expensive transportation spending plan.

“Busy day planned in New York. Will soon be making some very important decisions on the people who will be running our government!” Trump wrote on Twitter on Friday morning.

Trump’s most loyal supporters could play a prominent role in his administration. Campaign sources say Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions could serve as Defense Secretary, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich might be named as Secretary of State and retired General Michael Flynn could serve as national security adviser.

Those three, along with Giuliani and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, were named as vice chairs of the transition team on Friday.

DEMOCRATS REGROUP

Meanwhile, Democrats began regrouping from their loss. Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean said he wanted to return as head of the Democratic National Committee to build the party’s presence in conservative states.

Minnesota Representative Keith Ellison, a Muslim who leads the party’s liberal wing, also emerged as a candidate for the job, while former Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, whose presidential bid fizzled early this year, said he was taking a “hard look” at running for DNC chairman as well.

Though many top Democrats on Capitol Hill have pledged to try to cooperate with Trump, the Senate’s top Democrat sounded a defiant note.

“If this is going to be a time of healing, we must first put the responsibility for healing where it belongs: at the feet of Donald Trump, a sexual predator who lost the popular vote and fueled his campaign with bigotry and hate,” said Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid, who is retiring in January.

(Additional reporting by David Shepardson, Emily Stephenson, Ginger Gibson, Diane Bartz, Julia Harte and Julia Edwards Ainsley in Washington; Writing by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Bill Rigby)

IMAGE: U.S. President-elect Donald Trump gestures as Vice President-elect Mike Pence applauds (L) at their election night rally in Manhattan, New York, U.S., November 9, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Segar

Christie Returns To Town Halls As Polls Show U.S. Appeal Sagging

Christie Returns To Town Halls As Polls Show U.S. Appeal Sagging

By Terrence Dopp, Bloomberg News (TNS)

TRENTON, N.J. — For Chris Christie, all roads to the White House run through New Jersey.

The governor, trailing Jeb Bush and Scott Walker in polls measuring the popularity of potential Republican presidential candidates, has resumed home-state appearances as he seeks to score political victories. Since February, he’s held weekly town-hall meetings, where he’s assailed public-worker benefits and defended his staff’s settlement of an $8.9 billion pollution lawsuit with Exxon Mobil Corp. for $225 million.

The unscripted gatherings may represent Christie’s best chance of righting a campaign that’s stumbled even before it’s begun. The meetings allow him to interact with voters, pitch his agenda and grab news coverage through the format that helped build his national profile as a tough-talking Jersey guy. The most-viewed video on his YouTube page shows him sparring with a teacher over school-aid cuts during a 2010 town hall.

“It’s necessary for him, but I don’t know that it will be sufficient,” said Rick Wilson, a Florida-based Republican media consultant who worked on Rudy Giuliani’s failed 2008 campaign. “There are already doubts about what the purpose is of Chris Christie being in this race.”

A March 18 CNN poll showed Christie, 52, tied with Sen. Marco Rubio for sixth place among the likely Republican contenders, with 7 percent. That put him behind surgeon Ben Carson and ahead of Sen. Ted Cruz, who on Monday became the first to formally announce his candidacy.

Bush, the former Florida governor, was the leader with 16 percent, followed by Walker, the Wisconsin governor, at 13 percent. The poll’s error margin was 4.5 percentage points.

Christie, during his monthly “Ask the Governor” call-in radio show on Monday, said Cruz’s announcement won’t force him to accelerate his own timetable. The governor, who formed a political action committee in January to boost his visibility, said he intends to announce a decision in late spring or summer.

Tuesday marked the 132nd town-hall meeting since Christie took office in January 2010, and the fifth in as many weeks. It was held at a community center in solidly Republican Morris County during the middle of the workday near Christie’s hometown of Mendham. He answered questions about local issues with his usual blunt style and responded to queries about broader topics with rhetoric geared toward the national Republican base.

“No rights are given to you by government,” Christie said. “All rights are given by God.”

During the forum, Christie told the crowd he’s focused on his current job. Being limited to two terms gives him more freedom to rein in pensions and other entitlements without fear of voter backlash, he said.

The recent gatherings have been free of the confrontations with public workers that made Christie popular on YouTube.

Four years ago, Christie rejected calls to run for president from Republican leaders and executives including Home Depot Inc. co-founder Ken Langone, saying he wasn’t ready. After Hurricane Sandy leveled much of New Jersey’s coastline in October 2012, his response garnered him record approval and helped him win a second term in November 2013.

Those ratings have dropped to lows amid some residents’ complaints about the pace of rebuilding, concerns about New Jersey taxes and a recovery lagging behind neighboring states, and controversy over politically motivated lane closings at the George Washington Bridge.

In a March 3 poll by Fairleigh Dickinson University’s PublicMind, a record 51 percent of registered New Jersey voters disapproved of Christie’s performance.

Krista Jenkins, the poll director, said Christie “isn’t as much retreated as he is digging in” by attempting to steer the focus back to his current job. She said any success he has raising his numbers at home will benefit him elsewhere.

“He has to govern — even though clearly his aspirations are more national — but he’s going to be called to task if he abandons the state,” Jenkins said. “This is pretty natural, and it’s really a dance that he’s going to have to do until this thing really plays out.”

Christie’s February was marred by reports of donors lining up behind Bush, New Jersey allies facing fresh scandals and backlash over comments he made about vaccinations. He ended the month by proposing long-awaited fixes for New Jersey’s underfunded pension system and holding his first town hall in six months.

While many have written Christie off due to his low ratings, the bridge scandal and his lack of high-profile donors, Jenkins said “one good night in a debate can turn a campaign around.”

To be sure, Christie has won some recent victories in Trenton.

Democrats failed to gather enough votes to override the governor’s veto of legislation overhauling the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. He also persuaded Republican senators to vote against a Democratic-sponsored resolution condemning his $225 million settlement with Exxon Mobil over pollution at refineries in Bayonne and Linden. The settlement resolved a case dating to 2004.

Wilson, the Florida Republican, said he doesn’t expect Christie to be a contender for the White House. Christie’s campaign has been “over for a while” and the governor hasn’t recognized it, he said.

Christie’s break from conservative Republicans began with his embrace of President Barack Obama after Sandy and he has continued to alienate them, Wilson said.

“It’s hard to reboot in politics without an awful lot of money in your pocket, and he doesn’t have that right now,” he said. “He strides like a colossus in New Jersey, but when you go up against guys with a natural fluency in addressing Republicans and conservative voters, it’s hard for him to stand out.”

(c)2015 Bloomberg News, Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC

Photo: Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey speaking at the 2015 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland. (Gage Skidmore/Flickr)