NJ shutdown: In this budget drama, Phil Murphy both vilifies and imitates Chris Christie

Charles Stile | NorthJersey

Show Caption Hide Caption Budget battle in Trenton Governor Murphy and legislative leaders differ over numbers as they fail to approve a new budget. (June 21, 2018)

Gov. Phil Murphy vilifies his predecessor, Republican Chris Christie, at virtually every twist in the budget drama that threatens to shutter state government.

In Murphy's rendering, Christie was the reckless, "kick-the-can-down-the road" governor who left behind a state in a fiscal mess. Christie was the gimmick king who rammed through an unnecessary sales tax cut simply to pad his political résumé.

And Christie also publicly smeared respected economists from the Legislature. Murphy made it clear this week that there was to be no bashing of the experts like Christie did.

Yet, the first-term Murphy is not above lifting a familiar Christie trope. Christie, who vowed to turn Trenton upside down, often said he didn't care if all this tough-love budget cutting harmed his chances of reelection and he was willing to pay the political price.

Murphy also played the sacrificial lamb card on Monday.

"I didn’t come here to get reelected. I came here – I used to say I don’t care about my next reelection. I care about the next generation,'' he said as his traveling chorus of liberal activists and union leaders standing behind him applauded.

It's a cliche, yet it's one that has helped bring some clarity to Murphy's otherwise muddled, inconsistent messaging during this state budget battle.

The budget fight with fellow Democrats has given him a platform as the outsider became governor to "fix" the mess he inherited, to shake up the entrenched interests instead of serving as a get-along, go-along caretaker. He's casting himself as the new change agent clashing with the protectors of the status quo in the Democratic leadership that runs the Legislature.

And Murphy, the amiable happy warrior who is "incredibly honored" to appear on every stage with every supporter regardless of their place in the political pecking order, is vowing to get down-right ruthless, in a Christie kind of way.

Murphy is now threatening to use the line-item veto and wield it like a meat ax to the alternative state budget shepherded through the Legislature last week by Senate President Stephen Sweeney, D-Gloucester, and Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin, D-Middlesex.

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Christie also used the line-item veto to shock and infuriate the Democrats in 2011. His last-minute cuts blindsided Sweeney, who responded with a torrent of expletives. But that anger faded away as a colorful footnote of Christie's rollicking first term in Trenton.

Murphy's line-item veto warning comes much earlier in the process, but comes with a greater, long-term political risk. Yet, for the moment, Murphy refuses to give ground.

Murphy says he believes the alternative budget passed by the Democrats last week is a sham, built on a gimmicks and phantom revenues and hoped-on savings from audits.

Instead, Murphy wants more dependable, "sustainable" revenues — which is Wall Street speak for tax hikes, specifically an increase on millionaires and a restoration of the sales tax from 6.625 percent to 7 percent.

But Sweeney and Coughlin, leaders of the Democrat's right-of-center resistance, reject Murphy's hikes and have countered with a four-year tax increase on corporations. They are also hoping to raise money by letting tax deadbeats pay past bills without threat of penalty, and through audits of state programs.

Murphy is willing to discuss tweaking the terms of their proposed corporate hike, but on Wednesday he was resolute in his support of a millionaires tax. He also ratcheted up the rhetoric, coloring it with a touch of class warfare. He suggested that Sweeney and Coughlin were protecting 20,000 or so millionaires at the expense of everybody else.

"That is particularly mystifying,'' Murphy said.

Later in the day, Sweeney remained equally resolute in his opposition to raising the millionaires tax, reminding reporters that he voted for raising the millionaires tax five times over the years, but the new limit on state and local tax deductions in President Donald Trump's tax overhaul in December changed his mind. Hiking the income tax could be the final straw that could send New Jersey's millionaires fleeing to other states, taking their valuable income revenue with them.

Still Sweeney, inching toward compromise, countered Wednesday with a host of new proposals, including a plan to extend the sales tax to shore rentals. Both sides continue to talk, but the possibility of a shutdown remains an option if an agreement isn't reached by midnight Saturday.

“I don’t think there’s gonna be a shutdown,'' Sweeney said in a statehouse news conference Wednesday. "If there’s a shutdown, it’s because the governor decided to shut it down to raise taxes on people.”

In theory, Murphy could avert a shutdown by using his line-item veto, which allows him to remove items from the final budget but not add anything new. But he's not talking about a surgical, line-by-line trimming of fat from a $37 billion budget -- he is threatening to cut as much as $855 million from the Democrats' plan.

It would be a major, dramatic gamble. Those cuts would be felt throughout the state but would hit hard in the heartland of his Democratic liberal base, like Newark, where Murphy visited Wednesday.

Schools would face less than expected funds, forcing new pressures on towns to raise property taxes. Mass transit would remain in disrepair and there's a strong chance that rides would be hit with a fare increase. A promised increase in a tax credit for the working poor would be scuttled. Tuition aid for New Jersey college students might be trimmed. And so on.

If he does take that step, Murphy would also have to hope that his base will also focus the blame and anger on the legislative leaders, and not him. That might work for the short-term battle, but that reservoir of goodwill could wear thin over time.

For the moment, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, who appeared with the governor at a news conference Wednesday, was standing in Murphy's corner.

"We are comfortable with that idea...that that is an option for him to cut all of these programs, which means it will hurt people in Newark tremendously'' said Baraka, who added that to even be discussing potentially steep cuts to urban programs is "unconscionable."

For a change, Murphy avoided references to Christie on Wednesday, preferring to stick to his own message. And as he huddles in the final stretch with legislators behind closed doors, conjuring up the ghost of Christie isn't going to offer much help. He picked this fight and it's his to finish.