- [Narrator] Funding for this edition of One-On-One with Steve Adubato has been provided by IBEW Local 102.

Lighting the path, leading the way.

Hackensack Meridian Health.

Keep getting better.

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NJM Insurance Group.

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And by Operating Engineers, local 825.

Promotional support provided by AM970 The Answer.

And by Insider NJ.

- This is One-On-One.

- I'm an equal American just like you are.

- The jobs of tomorrow are not the jobs of yesterday.

- Look at this.

You get this?

- Life without dance is boring.

- I don't care how good you are or how good you think you are, there is always something to learn.

- Do you enjoy talking politics?

- No.

- People call me 'cause they feel nobody's paying attention.

- Our culture, I don't think has ever been tested in the way it's being tested right now.

- That's a good question, high five.

(upbeat music) - Hi, I'm Steve Adubato.

Welcome to a very special program where we are in fact honored to be joined by Governor Chris Christie, former Governor, Chris Christie.

By the way, Governor, they still call you Governor because once you're the governor, you're always the governor, right?

- Yeah, that's kind of seems like the way it works, there's some people who don't, Steve, but most people do.

And there's some people who weren't actually elected governor that wanna be called governor, but we won't talk about that.

- Only if you don'’t want.

I'm happy to.

- No I'm not because there are bigger picture issues.

We're taping, I'm gonna make it clear, you'll see it on the screen.

We never try to hide when we're taping because it's the 13th of January, historic day, there's a vote taking place in Congress, likely in the house for President Trump to be impeached a second time, the first president that will ever happen to.

Governor, let me ask you, the series is called Democracy at a Crossroads.

What is that crossroads as you look at where we are today and where you think we're gonna be over the next couple of months?

- Well, listen, I think that what happened on January 6th tells us that words matter, actions matter in a democracy more than almost anything.

The way we argue with each other, the way we debate, the way we discuss, and the way accept the verdict of democracy.

And I think the biggest sin the president has committed over his four years has been his conduct in the last nine weeks.

I said it on election night that there was no evidence that he had presented a fraud in the election.

He continued to say it though for nine weeks with no presentation of evidence, but a lot of people in the country and rightfully so wanna believe their president.

And so when the president continued to say the election was robbed, that it was a fraud, that he had won in a landslide even though all the evidence was to the contrary, some people still believed it.

Those words matter.

And it's what led to the riot on January 6th on Capitol Hill.

His actions, his words, his conduct inspired those people to do what they did.

- So let's do this, again, it is the 13th of January as we tape, this vote's taking place.

Joe Biden will be the president on the 20th and so will be seen after in February, March, et cetera.

But governor, you're also the former US attorney in New Jersey.

In fact, we were one of the, my colleague Raphael Pi Roman in public broadcasting, I think we did one of the first interviews with you in that role.

You're a law and order guy.

For those who believe in Donald Trump even after he is not present, but say they believe in the rule of law and law and order and respect police, support those in blue, how does that comport with what happened on January 6th?

- Well, it doesn't, it doesn't.

If you believe in law and order, then (indistinct) done if you want.

So I had no problem with people marching up to the Capitol, Steve, if they wanted to march outside the Capitol and yell and scream and get a microphone and let the people inside that building hear what they had to say, that's very American thing to do.

And I would have been more than happy to see that happen because people will have been expressing their point of view, which is what this country is all about.

But when you see the video of what happened up there, and the still photos, that shows disrespect for the people that you are assaulting, that you were in some instances, murdering.

We had two police officers die up there.

We have an air force veteran who was part of the crew, trying to enter the building killed.

And the president let us down on this too, because for a couple of days till Sunday after the police officer, the Capitol police officer who was from New Jersey, Officer Sicknick was murdered.

The flag was at half staff at the Capitol, but not at the white house.

- Why do you think that was the case?

- I think the president was angry about the entire incident that he was being blamed for it.

And didn't want him to acknowledge that officer's sacrifice.

I brought it up on-- - On ABC.

- On Sunday and said, how can you say you're the law and order president do that and then a couple of hours later, the flag was lowered to half staff as it should be.

If we are as I was, enraged by the protests this past summer, surrounding social justice, when they turned violent and when they turned to looting and to destroying property and hurting people.

We must be equally incensed by what happened on Capitol Hill.

Violence like that and rioting and looting and destroying our institutions, whether they're private institutions or the most public institution we have in this country, the Capitol, they were all wrong.

And if you're really a law and order person, you don't speak out just against one, you speak out against both.

So Governor, let me ask you, the longer term implications of this, you and I have had so many conversations both on the air and off, and there are times that we've gone back and forth and everyone who knows you, knows that you never hold back and you're aggressive and you're strong, and you're tough, and you say what's on your mind, get the hell off the beach.

That being said, what is the difference between the way you have governed and the way you communicate in your style and what we have seen in the Trump presidency, where let's be clear, you were supportive of Donald Trump, voted for him twice as you said, what is the biggest difference between the way you have governed and your style of communicating and Donald Trump's?

- Well, I'll specify right now, in these last nine weeks in particular, Steve.

- As we tape the last nine weeks, and by the way, we don't know whether he has Twitter or not, it's irrelevant.

He will still be hurt in some way, Governor.

- Sure he will, of course.

The difference is the truth.

Now, you can be blunt and direct, and I think public officials should be, I think that's what the public wants, but you have to tell the truth.

And when you're blunt and direct and you're lying, that's completely unacceptable.

And it's an abrogation of your responsibility as an elected official.

And to me, that is the single biggest difference.

I also think that I use bluntness and directness to frame an issue in order to reach a compromise.

The president has not done that.

Maybe that's the other big difference between our styles.

- What's Joe Biden's, as this program is seen, he'll be the president on the 20th of January and obviously beyond.

What is the biggest challenge he faces and what is the greatest opportunity, Governor Christie?

- I think the biggest challenge he faces is controlling his own party.

Now that they have majority in the house and the Senate and the white house.

- The Democrats.

- The Democratic Party has tended when they've had this, in the last two presidencies where they had it.

In the Clinton presidency and the Obama presidency, in those first few years to have drastically overreached, to have misread the appetite of the American people for the type of change that they've advocated for.

And as a result, they lost Congress both times.

In 1994 and in 2010.

Joe Biden lived through both of those.

The first time as a member of the Senate, going from the majority to the minority, and the second time as the vice president of the United States.

And I think his biggest challenge is gonna be reminding his colleagues of that lesson and trying to get them to implement the change they wanna implement, but to do so in a way that doesn't overreach.

I think his biggest opportunity is because of how long Joe Biden has been in government, because he's literally been in the federal government for nearly 50 years.

He has an opportunity to say, "I've seen a lot over these last 50 years, "and I want to work with Mitch McConnell "even though he's now the minority leader.

"I wanna work with Kevin McCarthy.

"I wanna find common ground on things like "infrastructure and national defense policy."

And if he does it, I think he presents his party and his country with a great opportunity to heal.

And so I think that's his biggest opportunity and overreach issue is his biggest challenge.

- I'm gonna talk to you about COVID in just a moment and your personal experience around COVID and the public service announcement that the governor has been putting out.

By the way, Governor, how can people check out, they've seen it everywhere, but where can, if they wanna just go online and see, where can they find your public service announcement?

- They can go to the COVID collective, Steve.

You go to the COVID collective on the internet and they're the group that sponsored the public service announcement.

So you go there and you'll be able to see the ad and a few others that have been made.

- By the way, yeah, I'm changing my mind.

I'm gonna stay on that.

You were very outspoken that you made a mistake.

You made a series of mistakes around how you handled yourself during COVID, particularly at the white house.

Remind people of those mistakes and the message you wanna share with people right now.

Again, the 13th of January, February, March, April, COVID will be just as real.

Go ahead, Governor.

- It will be here with us.

Listen, for seven months, Steve, from March until October, I wore a mask whenever I went out of my house, washed my hands 10 to 12 times a day, stayed out of big groups, did all the things that the public health advisors were telling us to do.

And as a result, I stayed healthy for four days in the white house thinking I was in a safe place because everyone was getting tested including myself, everyday.

I took my mask off and interacted with other people during preparations for the presidential debates.

And it was a huge mistake.

And what it taught me was, and what I'm trying to have other people benefit from my experience is there is no safe place from this virus, no safe place.

Excuse me, because even if the white house, if the white house is not safe, where people who come in there are being tested every day, there is no safe place in this country.

And so put your mask on.

I did it for seven months to stay healthy.

Is it 100% guarantee?

No.

But what we now know from statistics over the last nine, 10 months is that you're twice as likely to get COVID if you don't wear a mask than you are if you do.

And I can tell you, Steve, from having had it, it's not something you wanna get.

- You were in the ICU and you were very candid about that experience and how afraid you were, and that your family was.

And so number one, most importantly, we're glad you're doing well.

30 seconds on the vaccine, again, we're taping on the 13th of January.

Things are gonna change.

The CDC website will be up, check it out.

The biggest lesson that you believe we should be learning about vaccine distribution.

- We're just not being aggressive enough.

- As we speak right now.

Do you believe that the Biden administration could on the federal level, Governor, change that dramatically?

- Well, I think in their tone they can and I think that they will.

But I think this really has been a predominantly state problem.

- A state problem?

- Yeah, on the distribution of the vaccine.

- Not on supply though, Governor.

- No, no, no.

No no, no.

On the distribution.

Because let's face it, we're seeing in New Jersey, and New York, we've distributed already less than 40% of the supply we have.

- As we speak.

- As we speak.

That's outrageous.

Now, all of a sudden, we're gonna start to do some more aggressive things.

Empty stores are gonna be used as distribution centers here in New Jersey.

Citi Field is gonna be used as a distribution center.

- You had to bring that up because you're a Met fan, but go ahead.

- Listen, the Mets are giving and generous and their new owner, Steve Cohen, but show that cup all you want, but nothing has happened at Yankee Stadium to fight Covid.

- We'll make a call, go ahead, Governor.

- (indistinct) they're gonna be doing that at Citi Field.

This should have been done from the beginning by all the leaders in the state government and New Jersey has not done a good job on this, Steve.

And I can't understand why we weren't prepared.

In New Jersey, we delayed giving it to our seniors for a week because we missed the paperwork deadline.

And the commissioner of health said, "Oh, well, it's a lot of paperwork."

Well, I don't know what the hell else she was working on, but could there be anything more important, after all the seniors who have died in New Jersey, could there be anything more important than getting our seniors the vaccine?

My dad's 86 years old and has not yet had COVID.

I want my dad to get the vaccine.

And there's nothing more important than protecting our seniors at this point, who this disease has shown us are the most vulnerable in our society to this disease.

- And I'm hoping and praying that your dad gets the vaccine.

My mom, who is, my mom doesn't like when I talk about her age so I'll leave that alone.

Governor, can we do the Republican party?

And by the way, Judy Persichilli, the commissioner of health, we're actually taping, in about an hour or so from now, we're taping several interviews today.

She'll have an opportunity to make her case and I'll ask her about that paperwork.

That being said, Governor, the Republican party, and it's no secret, you may run, who knows?

You never tell me the truth about whether you're gonna run for president or not.

You didn't last time, you won't this time.

- That's okay.

- What's that?

- Why should I?

- Leave that alone.

Do you believe, Governor, that really two are going to be moving forward?

Two Republican parties, those loyal committed to Donald Trump whether he can never run for public office again, and those others who are not, like you, even though you were, but not a sycophant to the president, you've challenged him, you've questioned him, but you're still not gonna change your Republican party affiliation.

Long-winded question, two parties, two Republican parties?

- No.

No, no more than there are two democratic parties right now.

You looked at the battle that went on in the primary between Joe Biden and the more moderate wing of the democratic party.

- Trump doesn't change everything, Governor?

- No.

Listen, no, I don't think so, Steve.

I think everybody looks at the next election through the prism of the last one and it is always a mistake because times will change, circumstances will change.

Listen, a year ago, a year ago right now, Donald Trump was the overwhelming favorite to be re-elected.

Overwhelming favorite.

We didn't have COVID, COVID was still a good month or six weeks away from this January 13th date where we're taping.

And so circumstances changed.

I think what's happening in the Republican party right now, what will happen over the next couple of years will be what always happens when you get your head beat.

We lost the white house, we lost the house and we lost the Senate in four years.

When that happens, you better have a re-evaluation of how you're communicating to the public and what issues you're talking about and who your leaders are.

And so that's what's gonna happen in the very same way that I recall when George W. Bush won his second term in 2005, a real re-examination went on in the Democratic party that ultimately led to an outsider becoming the nominee - Barack Obama.

and not the insider favorite, Hillary Clinton.

So this always happens in political parties, Steve.

This is more dramatic because of the events of the past week up on Capitol Hill and because of the way Donald Trump's conducted himself since the election.

But I do think that we'll wind up being in the very same spot we're always in when we lose, which is to reevaluate and then regather to try to present a new picture to the American public.

- That is Chris Christie, former governor of the great state of New Jersey.

Also, check him out on ABC with George Stephanopoulos on Sundays, right?

And a whole range of other days because things happen all the time.

But he also told me offline.

He texted me and said, "If I choose to run for president in 2024, Steve, "you will be the person I tell first."

Is that not a fact?

- Yeah, sure.

And I've texted that to 12 other people too so good luck.

- Man, you just pick up those one line, I knew you'd be right there with that.

Hey, Governor Chris Christie, thank you so much.

Most importantly, best to you and your family.

Thank you, Chris.

- Thank you, Steve.

Thanks for having me.

- You got it.

I'm Steve Adubato, that's Chris Christie.

We'll be right back.

- [Narrator] To watch more One on One with Steve Adubato find us online and follow us on Social media.

- We're now joined by our good friend, Steve Politi, sports columnists at NJ Advance Media.

Check 'em out on NJ.com and old school Star-Ledger.

Hey Steve, listen, you blew me away with a column you wrote, "What did I learn in 2020?

The coronavirus was no match for the human spirit".

It was powerful, meaningful, impactful.

Why'd you write it, and what was the message?

Yeah, Steve, I was thrown into it.

Like a lotta people, I was thrown into a different role when the pandemic started, and I was covering all of the stories of people overcoming and really rallying during the pandemic.

And what I saw was just so many examples of normal people who really rose above their circumstances to make a difference in their communities.

And a guy like Greg Dailey, who was a paper delivery person who was bringing not just newspapers to his subscribers, but groceries to people who couldn't get out of their houses and just stories like that really touched me.

And when I thought back on what I learned during 2020, it was really that as tough as the pandemic was, it was not a match for just the human spirit.

- What about the guy 55 days on the ventilator, Michael?

Say his last name.

- Somekh.

- Tell us about him because it was so moving.

- Yeah, and this is a story that really touched me.

Again, he's a guy who drove himself into the hospital.

He thought, "I just needed a quick checkup.

"I need some oxygen.

"I'll be back, and I'll be back in a couple of days."

And, right away, he was put on the ventilator.

And what I wanted to capture in that story was just what his family went through and how they really suffered through these days without knowing that their father and their brother and their son was gonna make it through.

And what he told me at the end was just when he got through it, he realized that if he had died, he would have just not been there anymore.

But what struck him in thinking about it was just the number of lives that would have been changed, and that's what keeps him up at night was just thinking about how his friends and his family and his daughters would have been touched if he didn't make through this struggle.

- Let me try this one.

By the way, the other one I'm wanna ask you about in a second is, is it Peter Cave?

- Yes, yes.

- I'm gonna you about that in a second, but I'm gonna ask you about sports.

So the role of sports, not just for those of us who are obsessed with collegiate sports and professional sports.

I hold this up all the time.

I'm an old school.

Derek Jeter will always be the greatest Yankee of the last generation.

That being said, the role of high school sports and sports in our lives in COVID, during COVID and beyond.

There's a question here, I promise.

What have kids lost who couldn't play, compete, be involved in sports, particularly in high school?

- Well, I think that was a devastating thing, especially for the athletes this spring.

I talked to one girl softball player who was three hits away from a town, a city record and having her name in immortality, and all she wanted to do was just have one more opportunity to be on the field with her teammates just to enjoy that, just to have that experience.

And it's something that that the athletes in the spring lost.

And one reason why I think it was a good decision.

- Spring 2020, spring 2020.

- Correct, yes.

- So what could it mean in 2021 in the spring as we get closer to it?

We don't know how the vaccine's gonna play out, but say we can play safer, that kids can be out there.

What would it mean to those kids?

By the way, the other kids really got hurt terribly, but go ahead, Steve.

I'm sorry.

- No, absolutely.

I think we saw this fall what it meant.

It was a difficult decision to have football season go on, soccer season, but with the precautions, and the kids took it very seriously.

They policed themselves in a lotta situations to make sure they could keep playing, and I think it made a big difference.

I think you saw a lotta communities rally around their teams.

I live in Montclair where they had two state championships soccer teams, and yeah, I think you saw just how important that was for those athletes and for the parents and just for the community to have something that resembled normalcy.

- Yeah, by the way, I'm Montclair, as well.

That was a big deal for our town.

- It was indeed.

- So Peter Cave, who's Peter Cave, and why does Peter's story matter?

- Well, we did a story on 24 hours in crisis about every reporter at NJ Advance Media was farmed out across the state to capture different scenes during the pandemic, and mine was to go to a crematorium in the cemetery.

I get all the good assignments, Steve.

And I had just stumbled upon a man's funeral in which his family couldn't attend.

And it was just very, it just struck me as very emotionally.

His relatives were outside a fence outside of the cemetery because of the restrictions on outdoor gatherings.

And I happened to be there, and in watching this happen and watching this very quick funeral service, I just thought it was extremely unfair that this man's life didn't get the treatment that we all need when we were mourning.

So I went back and I did the best to report on what had happened to him, who he was, what his life was like and, of course, what it meant to his family not to have this opportunity to mourn him.

And I wanted to be able to write about their experiences and just what we've lost.

It's a bigger picture of what, as communities, what we've lost because of this.

- By the way, check out NJ.com to see Steve's, not only this column about the human spirit and connection to COVID, but everything else he's written.

We have about a minute left.

Let me ask you this.

I've interviewed you so many times, a lot in my radio work and here, as well.

You've always struck me as an upbeat, positive guy.

Question, and I actually interviewed Eric LeGrand.

Check out our website, SteveAdubato.org, for extraordinary interview, not because of me, but because of LeGrand.

Talk about a positive attitude, a former Rutgers superstar paralyzed in 2010 game against Army.

How do you stay positive, Steve?

Got a minute left.

In the midst of all this crisis, COVID and beyond, how do you stay so positive?

- I think you have to focus on the stories and the people who are doing uplifting things, and they're not hard to find.

I mean, they're all around us.

And that's part of, you know, like the pizza guy who took out a $50,000 loan to pay off his employees and the guy who owned a gym who went around in a mascot costume to help kids workout.

I mean, there's just so many examples of that.

And when it did get overwhelming and when things, you know, there are many bad days.

You're trapped in your house with your kids.

You wanna kill 'em.

I understand.

But it wasn't hard to find examples of the human spirit that really kept a smile on your face.

- I'm gonna repeat what I said before offline to you and repeated again.

Reading your work on a regular basis and not just about sports, but about our lives and about the human spirit has been helpful to me, and I know I'm not alone.

So to Steve Politi, sports columnists at NJ Advance Media, I'm wanna thank you, not just for the column we talked about, but for the work you do every day.

Best to you and your family, Steve Politi, all the best.

Thank you.

- Thanks, Steve.

I really appreciate that.

Thank you.

- You got it.

I'm Steve Adubato.

That is the more important Steve, Steve Politi.

Thank you so much for joining us, and we'll see ya next time.

- [Narrator] One-On-One with Steve Adubato has been a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Funding has been provided by IBEW Local 102.

Hackensack Meridian Health.

Gibbons P.C.

NJM Insurance Group.

And by Operating Engineers, local 825.

Promotional support provided by AM970 The Answer.

And by Insider NJ.