Barbour: NJ mayor won’t succeed in ‘shaking Christie down’

Former Gov. Haley Barbour (R-Miss.) said Tuesday a New Jersey mayor alleging a new scandal won’t succeed in “shaking Christie down.” 

In an interview on MSNBC’s “The Daily Rundown,” Barbour pushed back against allegations Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer made over the weekend in which she accused Gov. Chris Christie’s (R-N.J.) administration of withholding Hurricane Sandy relief funds.

{mosads}On Saturday, Zimmer claimed in an interview on MSNBC that members of the governor’s staff threatened to not hand over recovery money unless she approved a development project. 

“I don’t think she’s going to succeed in shaking Christie down,” Barbour said of Zimmer on Tuesday.

On CNN a day earlier, Barbour called Zimmer “a lady mayor.” MSNBC host Chuck Todd asked Barbour if he regretted making the statement. 

“I didn’t mean for it to be taken the wrong way. Somebody wrote me a note about it and I wrote her back. I said, ‘Thanks for the constructive criticism,’ ” he said.

Barbour added that “the liberal media elite” has been chasing Christie around like it’s a scandal on the level of the Abraham Lincoln assassination. 

“He can be, and will be in my opinion, an outstanding governor of New Jersey,” Barbour said.