Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi poses for a police booking photo on July 30, 2010 in Seaside Heights. She was arrested in the New Jersey beach town and charged with disorderly conduct after being reported by other beach-goers. (Seaside Heights Police Dept. via Getty Images)

TRENTON -- Gov. Chris Christie says it isn't the Bridgegate scandal that's kept New Hampshire voters from making him the 2016 Republican presidential front-runner, but shows like "The Sopranos" and "Jersey Shore."

Appearing on CNN's "The Lead with Jake Tapper" on Tuesday afternoon, the New Jersey governor was asked about a question posed by a man at a Monday town hall meeting in New London, N.H.

"When we talk about you ... one the biggest things I hear all the time is 'shady,'" asked the man. "How do you convince me ... that you're not 'shady' and you're actually here to help us?"

Christie also dismissed the notion that the Bridgegate scandal was, as Tapper put it, "indicative of a bigger problem with you."

""If you showed the rest of that tape, I then asked him, 'What made you think that?' and he said, 'I don't know,'" the governor said. "He said, 'I think it's probably because you're from New Jersey.' So ... there are just certain cultural things that get baked in in some people's minds, after, you know, 'Jersey Shore' and 'The Sopranos' that make people think a certain way."

Christie built a reputation for rooting out corruption by public officials as the U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, and has long declared his hatred for the now-cancelled series, "Jersey Shore." In 2011, he famously blocked a $420,000 film credit that was approved for the MTV show by the New Jersey Economic Development Authority, saying its louche antics hurt the state's image.

The governor told Tapper that he told the New Hampshire voter he couldn't change the fact that he was a New Jersey native who was "born there, raised there, proud to be from there" concluding, "That's all that really was."

Claude Brodesser-Akner may be reached at cbrodesser@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @ClaudeBrodesser. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.