TPMMuckraker Ralph Marra
Chris Christie
Beyond Brown: Did Another Top Christie Aide Politicize Prosecutor's Office To Help Former Boss?
Zachary Roth | October 21, 2009, 2:35PM
U.S. prosecutor Ralph Marra
So far, the charges that Chris Christie turned the U.S. attorney's office into a "branch office" of his campaign for governor, as Jon Corzine put it yesterday, have centered on the relationship between Christie and Michele Brown, a close friend and top aide to Christie when he was US attorney. Brown reportedly took several actions this year that benefited Christie's GOP bid for governor, and in 2007 got an undisclosed $46,000 loan from him.
But did another of Christie's former top aides also put the prosecutor's office in the service of his one-time boss's political aspirations? Ralph Marra, who until this month was the acting U.S. attorney, has several times appeared to insert himself into the political back-and-forth over the race, appearing to pointedly criticize a request by the Corzine campaign for public information, and even triggering a Justice Department probe into whether he made inappropriately political public comments that may have boosted Christie.
PERMALINK | COMMENTS (4) | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (3)Topics: Chris Christie, Jon Corzine, Michele Brown, Ralph Marra, U.S. Attorneys
Chris Christie
Did Christie Politicize U.S. Attorney's Office?
Zachary Roth | October 20, 2009, 2:00PM
NJ Gov. Candidate Chris Christie (R) and his fmr. top aide Michele Brown
Back in August, when it was revealed that Chris Christie had given an unreported $46,000 loan to Michele Brown, his top deputy at the US attorney's office, we had a sense there was more to the story than we'd yet learned.
And today's revelations from the New York Times help fill out the picture. Simply put, a close look at the unusually close relationship between the two -- as well as at other evidence that Christie retains ties to his former colleagues in the prosecutors' office -- strongly suggests that in the service of his bid for governor, he may have improperly politicized an office that's supposed to be an independent administrator of justice.
PERMALINK | COMMENTS (19) | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (6)Topics: Chris Christie, Jon Corzine, Michele Brown, Ralph Marra, Robert Menendez, U.S. Attorneys
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