Christie shows how not to launch a campaign

by: Jason Springer

Mon Jan 12, 2009 at 11:30:00 AM EST

As a former campaign manager and press secretary, this is embarrassing:

The "Dear Friend" e-mail from a Bill Stepien was signed by Christie but not received by some media for two hours after others. There wasn't a contact number to ask questions. Replies to the e-mail referred folks to state Sens. Bill Baroni, R-Mercer, and Joe Kyrillos, R-Monmouth, both of whom were out of state.
Rumor at the State House is Christie is hiring Michael DuHaime to run the operation. DuHaime's recent campaigns included Republicans Rudy Giuliani for president, John McCain for president and the 2006 Republican U.S. Senate campaign, the one where the Democrats took over the Senate. He was deputy campaign manager for former congressman Bob Franks' 2002 U.S. Senate bid.
The pre-announcement announcement was poorly handled and his supporters who think Christie is the only hope to save New Jersey had better pray it's better handled from here on.

While not the biggest deal in the world, he's running for Governor, not dog catcher. People have been planning his campaign for years and they couldn't have a media contact available to extol his praises? Then again, maybe he's going to have a policy of not allowing people to comment on an ongoing campaign.

Christie decided to declare himself Mr. Mom while walking out from picking his kids up from school for an impromptu press conference. On Reporter's Roundtable this week, Michael Aron told us just how last minute the presser was:

"That was a quickly improvised press availability. By the way, as of 10:30 Thursday morning, there was going to be no access to Christie. And by 12:30, they had said if you get to the school by 2:15, you can see him bringing his kids out from school and he stopped and talked for a while."

It seems like the only people surprised by Christie's candidacy were his own campaign team. If I'm a Christie Supporter (and I'm not), I wouldn't be thrilled with this start.

Jason Springer :: Christie shows how not to launch a campaign