TRENTON -- Amid an avalanche of negative polls since winning a second term in office and after weeks of testimony in the George Washington Bridge lane closure scandal trial that further damaged his image among New Jerseyans, Gov. Chris Christie says he's fighting for his reputation.

Christie insisted he would have been "happy to appear at the trial" so he could tell his version of events of the Bridgegate scandal, which rocked his political career and could send two of his former associates to federal prison for years.

"I'm not going to sit silent any longer," Christie said in an interview with Charlie Rose.

"I didn't do anything wrong," he said. "What matters to me most is my reputation, and that's what I'm fighting for."

Christie added: "It is maddening to sit here as a good person, who tried their very best, not to be perfect, but to try their best to be subjected to that. And I'm no longer going to be a punching bag on this."

Rose interviewed Christie at his home in Mendham on Sunday, where the governor lives with his wife and their children. Christie described the upheaval the seven-week-long Bridgegate trial had on his family.

"My wife and children having to read this everyday," Christie said, adding it was an "awful time."

A small portion of the interview aired Monday morning and the full interview appeared later on PBS.

Christie suggested the verdicts against his two former associates vindicated him.

"There were three people responsible," Christie said. "My first reaction was that the jury confirmed what I thought on Jan. 9, 2014."

The three people Christie referred to were the admitted architect of the political revenge scheme, David Wildstein, Christie's former deputy chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, and Bill Baroni, Christie's top appointee at the Port Authority.

A jury found Baroni and Kelly guilty on Friday of all counts prosecutors charged them with after Kelly's now-infamous "time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee" email was revealed on Jan. 9, 2014.

Wildstein already pleaded guilty.

"I don't think it says anything about me," Christie insisted in the interview.

Christie said the lane closures Wildstein admitted was a political revenge scheme to punish Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich for not endorsing Christie's re-election bid made no sense to him.

The governor said if he could ask Wildstein a question, he would ask him "why?"

"The idea that someone would think that this type of thing would make sense is a complete mystery," he said.

He stressed repeatedly in the interview that Baroni, Kelly and Wildstein, who he he referred to as liars, never claimed they told Christie it was a political revenge plot. Rather, Christie said, he was told in October 2013 that it was a traffic study.

However, Kelly testified under oath that she told the governor during the lane closures that Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich had complained and said he thought the gridlock was punitive.

Gov. Chris Christie.

Also, despite Christie's insistence that the verdict against Baroni and Kelly cleared him of any wrongdoing, the governor has yet to address how testimony from some of his former and current close associates contradicted what the governor said about when he learned of the Bridgegate scandal.

"I had no knowledge or involvement in this issue, in its planning or it execution, and I am stunned by the abject stupidity that was shown here," Christie said on Jan. 9, 2014, a day after Kelly's email surfaced.

But Michael DuHaime, Christie's longtime political adviser, testified he told the governor that Kelly and Christie's former political guru, Bill Stepien, were involved in the closures a month before Christie made that statement.

DuHaime testified he told the governor "it was not just Bridget Kelly we were talking about, it was Bridget Kelly and Bill Stepien" on a Dec. 11, 2013, phone call.

Two days later, Christie held a press conference where he told reporters no one on his staff knew about the closures.

"I've made it very clear to everybody on my senior staff that if anyone had any knowledge about this that they needed to come forward to me and tell me about it, and they've all assured me that they don't," Christie said at the time. "I've spoken to Mr. Stepien, who's the person in charge of the campaign, and he has assured me the same thing."

But, according to DuHaime, Christie knew otherwise.

"He knew I had information different from the information he gave," DuHaime testified.

Similarly, Christie's former press secretary, Michael Drewniak, testified he also told Christie in December 2013 that he learned from Wildstein that Stepien and Kelly were involved.

The interview aired the same day a new poll showed Christie's popularity among New Jerseyans is an another all-time low.

Just 19 percent of voters have a favorable opinion of Christie, according to a Rutgers Eagleton poll released Monday. Christie is not too far from the record low ratings set by governors in Eagleton's 45 years of polling on New Jersey governors, according to Ashley Koning, interim director of the Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling at Rutgers University.

Christie's ratings are down four points since just six weeks ago when the trial on the politically motivated George Washington Bridge lane closings began. Seventy-three percent view the governor unfavorably, up six points.

Matt Arco may be reached at marco@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @MatthewArco or on Facebook. Follow NJ.com Politics on Facebook.