New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said he intends to serve out the rest of his term. | AP Photo At White House, Christie says no interest in joining Trump administration

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said Wednesday morning that he is not interested in a job in the administration of President Donald Trump because he intends to serve out the remainder of his term as governor.

Christie, one of Trump’s highest-profile surrogates during the 2016 campaign, was a finalist last summer to join the GOP ticket as vice president and was believed to have been a top contender for multiple high-level jobs including White House chief of staff, attorney general and secretary of homeland security. The New Jersey governor was the chairman of the president’s transition team during the campaign but was replaced within days of Trump’s victory with Vice President Mike Pence.


Speaking from the north lawn of the White House, where he will attend meetings Wednesday with Trump as chairman of the president’s new commission on opioid abuse, Christie told NBC’s “Today” show that he will stay in his job as New Jersey’s governor through the end of his term in early 2018, although he did not rule out joining the Trump administration once his gubernatorial career ends.

“I’m the governor of New Jersey, Matt. I’ve made it really clear to the president that it’s my desire to finish my time as governor of New Jersey,” Christie told “Today” anchor Matt Lauer, who inquired if Christie might be interested in a job like White House chief of staff, a position currently occupied by former Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus. “Any speculations about that kind of stuff is just not something that I’m going to address because I’ve got a job, and I enjoy doing it and I want to keep it.”

Amid the constant swirl of controversy that has surrounded the Trump administration from almost the moment it began, much of the criticism, including some from unnamed White House officials speaking to reporters, has been directed at Priebus. Appearing last weekend on “Fox News Sunday,” Priebus contended that “I’m not in any trouble” and chalked up reports of infighting among White House staffers as “gossip.”

Wednesday morning on NBC, Christie offered a broad defense of the Trump administration, refusing to offer a letter grade for it and instead telling the “Today” show hosts that with just over two months under its belt, the White House should be given “an incomplete.”

“It’s nine weeks down and 199 weeks to go in the first term of this administration. So I would suggest that everybody take a breath. I’ve never seen such breathlessness over nine weeks of work,” Christie said. “He’s going to do the things over the course of his four years that’s going to keep the promises he’s made to the American people.”

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With two of his former aides set to be sentenced later Wednesday back in New Jersey over the Bridgegate scandal that many blamed for Christie’s fall from grace during the Trump transition, the governor refused to say whether he thought jail time for his former advisers would be appropriate.

“The judge will do what the judge believes is appropriate,” he said. “It’s not my role or anybody else’s role other than the judge in that courtroom to pass sentence on people who have committed crimes.”