The governor’s rant, which came toward the end of a speech primarily focused on ways to combat heroin addiction, seemed to be set off by an editorial in The Sunday Star-Ledger that declared it is “time to legalize weed.” | AP Photo Christie: 'Crazy liberals' want to 'poison our kids' with marijuana

PRINCETON — Gov. Chris Christie on Monday attacked supporters of legalizing marijuana as “crazy liberals” who are willing to “poison our kids” for the tax revenue, even as he suggested the state’s next governor could make the issue a top agenda item.

“They want that blood money? Let them do it,” Christie said sarcastically during an hour-long speech at a conference on substance abuse hosted by the New Jersey Hospital Association in Princeton. “And they will. Let me tell you something — this will be like priority number one come January. I guarantee you, if we have a Democratic governor, it will be priority number one.”


Medical marijuana was legalized in New Jersey eight years ago, and signed into law just before Christie took office. While there’s growing support for legalizing the drug altogether, Christie, a Republican, has long been against doing so and also killed some efforts to expand the medical marijuana program, which is among the most stringent in the nation.

Numerous Democratic candidates for governor have said they support or are open to permitting recreational marijuana use, including front-runner Phil Murphy.

Christie called out Murphy by name, along with two other Democratic politicians he said are leading the effort: Sen. Nick Scutari, a sponsor of a bill to legalize pot, and Senate President Stephen Sweeney, who is willing to support the measure. Scutari led a bipartisan delegation of lawmakers to Colorado last year to look at the legal marijuana industry there.

“People like Nick Scutari and Steve Sweeney and Phil Murphy want to bring this poison, legalized, into this state under the premise that, well, it doesn’t matter because people can buy it illegally anyway,” Christie said. “Then why not legalize heroin? I mean, their argument fails just on that basis. Let’s legalize cocaine. Let’s legalize heroin. Let’s legalize angel dust. Let’s legalize all of it. What’s the difference? Let everybody choose.”

The governor cited statistics, without attaching a source, that he said show teenage marijuana users are 10 times more likely to become heroin addicts by the age of 24.

Such “gateway drug” research has been dismissed by many. Scutari, a Union County lawmaker and the municipal prosecutor in Linden, said that argument falls flat when you consider other legal drugs, like alcohol and cigarettes.

“One has nothing to do with the other. It’s really an unscientific comment,” Scutari said.

He later added: “To try to pull off some kind of a nexus between the opioid and heroin crisis and legalizing pot is ridiculous, misplaced and unscientific.”

A spokesman for Sweeney declined to comment. Murphy's campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The governor’s rant, which came toward the end of a speech primarily focused on ways to combat heroin addiction, seemed to be set off by an editorial in The Sunday Star-Ledger that declared it is “time to legalize weed.” Christie called it “the idiot Star-Ledger.”

The governor cited an estimate from liberal think tank New Jersey Policy Perspective, mentioned in the editorial, that suggested the state could receive about $300 million in annual tax revenue from recreational marijuana.

“This is the part that liberals love the most: We can tax it,” Christie said, to laughs. “Sweet Jesus, we can tax it! More money for us!”

While that might sound like a lot of money, the governor said, it is not.

“I can say this now because I’m not running for anything again: $300 million is nothing,” Christie said. “We have a $35.5 billion budget; $300 million is a rounding error. I’m sorry, it’s true. Think about it; that’s 1 percent — less than 1 percent — of the entire state budget for a year. And we’re going to poison our kids for 1 percent more money that they can spend on some God awful, stupid program that they can put in the mailer and send out and say, ‘I delivered $300 million more for this.’”

In the same breath, Christie noted $300 million is a familiar number: It’s the amount he’s been demanding Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, the state’s largest insurer, hand over to support his anti-addiction efforts. The insurer has said the money is needed to ensure it has adequate reserve to cover claims.

“These same people are unwilling to commit to forcing the monopolistic insurance company in this state from contributing $300 million in excess profits to expand drug treatment,” Christie said of lawmakers. “How ironic would be it be if these dopes actually legalize marijuana and take the $300 million they say it’s going to raise and put it toward drug treatment. Talk about chasing your tale.”