Gov. Chris Christie has again relinquished the opportunity to take a firm stand for the health and well-being of New Jersey.

He has vetoed a bipartisan bill to ban the waste products of the natural gas extraction process known as fracking from shipment into the state for disposal.

While New Jersey has no fracking operations in place, Pennsylvania has been hard at harvesting the gas from deep underground deposits by injecting water at such high levels of pressure that it fractures the rock formations guarding the gas.

The toxin-laden wastewater is then injected back into the ground, treated or shipped away. In Oklahoma, injection of the water into deep underground wells is the likely cause of earthquakes according to several seismographic studies.

In Pennsylvania, hundreds of millions of gallons of wastewater laced with benzene, radium and arsenic — to name but a few — went through municipal water treatment plants that were not equipped to remove its most dangerous toxins. The water was then discharged into rivers, sometimes just a mile or so upstream from drinking water intake pipes.

We’ve been waiting for years for a definitive study from the Environmental Protection Agency on potential impacts of hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas on drinking water resources.

Yet without a clear determination on the ingredients of the wastewater and their potential ramifications, New Jersey has declared itself open for business.

The governor says refusing to allow the wastewater into the state — for treatment, discharge, storage or disposal — would violate the Dormant Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

What’s more, the Office of Legislative Services has determined that the bill is, in fact, constitutional because it doesn’t seek to protect any in-state commercial interests.

“The courts have generally recognized that local government has a legitimate interest in regulating matters affecting the public health, safety and welfare as long as the burden imposed is not clearly excessive,” according to the OLS.

Once again, we suspect that Gov, Christie is looking beyond the borders of New Jersey and toward 2016. His stance may play well in Peoria — and Iowa — but it’s keeping a door wide open for environmental ills to come flooding into New Jersey.

In the absence of due caution from the administration, we remind the Senate and the Assembly that they have the votes to override this veto. We call on lawmakers to use those votes rather than backing down as they have before.

Stand up to the governor and stand up for New Jersey.

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