Q&A
Mastro's work on the Bridgegate scandal for Chris Christie
3:51:06
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5 min
Council Member Farías questions Randy Mastro about his work investigating the Bridgegate scandal for then-Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey. Mastro defends his investigation and report against accusations of bias and lack of transparency.
- Farías outlines the Bridgegate scandal and Mastro's role in investigating it
- She criticizes Mastro's report as a 'whitewash' designed to protect Christie
- Farías questions Mastro's failure to retain contemporaneous notes from interviews
- Mastro defends his investigation, stating that subsequent investigations reached similar conclusions
- He argues that their investigative methods were appropriate and in line with standard practices
- Mastro emphasizes that his team acknowledged wrongdoing where they found it
- He points out that the U.S. Supreme Court ultimately ruled 9-0 that there was no federal crime, aligning with his team's initial assessment
Amanda Farías
3:51:06
that we can move on.
3:51:08
We can move on, Mister Mashrou.
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During your career in private practice, you have from time to time representing government officials and have been been paid using taxpayer dollars.
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The work you've done in those contexts can tell us a great deal about how you would comport yourself as the most powerful attorney for the city.
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Let's talk about one of these instances.
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Your work for the then Republican governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie, on Bridgegate scandal.
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Bridgegate was a political scandal that rocked New Jersey And National Politics in 2013.
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In the scandal, Governor Christie was accused of deliberately creating a massive traffic problem on the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee.
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New Jersey as a retribution against the mayor of Fort Lee, a Democrat who had not supported Christie in his reelection campaign in 2013.
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When the scandal started to damage Governor Christie's political aspirations for higher office, he hired you.
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Since the taxpayers were footing the bill, which ended up being $8,000,000, Governor Christie promised that your work would be independent and transparent.
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The investigative report that you produced was neither of those things and was criticized for 2 main reasons.
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First, your report was widely derided as a whitewash designed to protect Governor Christie rather than to get to the truth.
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Some does, your report, the Randy Mastro defense brief, because it was so evidently one-sided.
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A crystal clear indication that your work failed, the most basic test of credibility and transparency was your failure to retain contemporaneous notes from the interviews that you have conducted.
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In other investigations, your firm has taken contemporaneous notes during interviews and preserve them.
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It as it is standard legal practice.
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However, for the Bridgegate investigation, you intentionally changed your approach and overwrote those notes as you were finalizing your report.
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A New Jersey federal judge, Susan Wengensen, sharply criticized your failure to preserve these notes, calling it distasteful and out of line with standard legal practice.
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Judge Wington Wington added that New Jersey residents deserve better.
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And while the erasure of your notes may have been a clever tactic to help hide facts from the media and other investigators, When public investigations are involved, straightforward luring is superior to calculated strategy.
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Fundamentally, your report was not a serious piece of legal work, but instead political work attempting to clear your principle from wrongdoing.
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Mister Mastro, Why shouldn't New Yorkers be concerned that you'll do the same in our city and use taxpayer dollars as the guise of legal process to act as a political operative for the mayor?
Randy Mastro
3:53:41
Okay.
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Because that totally mischaracterizes the the investigative work and defense of the governor's office, not the governor personally, and the report that we prepared, which dealt with 2 issues.
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Bridgegate, and an accusation by the mayor of Hoboken, where her allegations were so thoroughly debunked and dropped by any investigators that no one mentions that anymore based on the work that we did.
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And let me just say this.
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The the results of our investigation where we attributed we we acknowledge that there had been certain wrongdoing and and who was responsible for it.
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But Every subsequent investigation reached the same basic conclusions we did.
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The US attorney's office, it charged 2 individuals.
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It didn't charge the governor.
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It didn't charge other members of his staff.
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The New Jersey attorney general's office it reached the same conclusions.
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The Bergen County prosecutor's office, it reached the same conclusion.
Devorah Halberstam
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So what did you ask me to know?
Randy Mastro
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Please please let me finish because you said some very serious things.
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Okay?
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I've asked you the method in which we conducted our investigation It was not standard operating procedure.
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Actually, the FBI in conducting criminal investigations produces one document.
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It's called a 302 of witness interviews.
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That's actually standard federal practice.
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And in complex investigations today that the law firms do on behalf of clients, it is common to work off of a central database, produce one final document and interview memos.
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There was nothing that was concealed from the public.
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We did over 80 interviews.
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We produced thousands of pages of evidence based on the work that we did.
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And, yes, I'm familiar with what the judge had to say who didn't come from an investigative background.
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She had been a civil lawyer.
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The fact of the matter is that the way we conducted that investigation was not only responsible.
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It was, in fact, the conclusion reached by every other
Amanda Farías
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So can you can you respond to my question?
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In?
Randy Mastro
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Yes.
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So people should have confidence in my ability to do things the right way.
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And the fact of the matter is that I was in that instance representing a client which was the governor's office And we said to the US attorney's office at the time that there had been no federal crime committed by anyone even if certain people engaged in wrongdoing.
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And ultimately, the US attorney So what I have great respect for, I think he has great respect for me.
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Decided to indict and prosecute anyway.
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And at the end of the day, the Supreme Court ruled 9 to nothing that there was no federal crime there.
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So people in New York should have confidence that I will stand up and I will speak truth, the power, In this case, the truth to power was to the US attorney.
Amanda Farías
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Okay.
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Your report also widely was widely criticized for its blatant sexism.
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The central conclusion of your report was that Brigitte Anne Kelly, a former Christie aid, was responsible for the traffic jams.
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And issues.
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And she took these actions because she was upset over being dumped by her former boss.