NEWARK, N.J. — Federal prosecutors brought charges Friday against three former allies of Gov. Chris Christie — but not Christie himself — in the George Washington Bridge traffic scandal, easing the legal threat that has hung over his 2016 White House ambitions for more than a year.
One of those charged, David Wildstein, a former high-ranking official at the transportation agency that operates the bridge, pleaded guilty, saying he and the other defendants engineered huge traffic jams to get even with a local politician.
Christie was not publicly implicated in any wrongdoing and appears to be in the clear.
“Based on the evidence currently available to us, we’re not going to charge anyone else in this scheme,” said U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman.
The Republican governor claimed vindication. “Today’s charges make clear that what I’ve said from day one is true — I had no knowledge or involvement in the planning or execution of this act,” he said.
Wildstein, a former official at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges, saying in court that he and the other Christie loyalists closed lanes and engineered the gridlock in September 2013 as political payback against a Democratic mayor.
He also said the three of them concocted a cover story: It was all part of a traffic study.
Wildstein, 53, could face about two years in prison.
The two people he implicated — former Christie deputy chief of staff Bridget Kelly and Bill Baroni, who was the governor’s top appointee at the Port Authority — were charged in an indictment unsealed later in the day.
Essentially, the defendants were accused of misusing public resources for political gain.
While Christie appears to be out of legal danger, politically it could be more complicated. He has been putting off for months a decision on whether to run for president. The charges put the scandal back in the news. Some of Christie’s foes have suggested that even if he had no direct role in the plot, he created a culture that led members of his administration to think they could get away with such tactics.
