Trump threatens Chris Christie and ABC News after watching critical ‘This Week’ interview

By Liam Reilly, Alejandra Jaramillo, Isabelle D’Antonio, CNN

(CNN) — President Donald Trump on Sunday threatened to investigate Chris Christie over a decade-old political scandal and revoke ABC News’ broadcasting license after the Disney-owned network aired an interview in which the former governor sharply criticized the president.

“Donald Trump sees himself as the person who gets to decide everything, and he doesn’t care about any separation. In fact, he absolutely rejects the idea that there should be separation between criminal investigations and the politically elected leader of the United States,” Christie said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” while discussing the FBI’s Friday morning raid of Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton’s home and office.

“I just watched Sloppy Chris Christie be interviewed” on ABC’s “This Week,” the president posted to his social media platform hours later. He accused Christie, a former Trump ally, of lying “about the dangerous and deadly closure of the George Washington Bridge in order to stay out of prison,” referring to the 2013 “Bridgegate” scandal in which several Christie aides and allies colluded to create traffic jams on the bridge to punish a local Democratic mayor. (Christie was never implicated in the scandal and has long denied any connection to the conspiracy.)

“Chris refused to take responsibility for these criminal acts,” Trump added. “For the sake of JUSTICE, perhaps we should start looking at that very serious situation again? NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW!” The president’s social-media post also mocked “This Week” host Jonathan Karl’s physical appearance and the show’s “bad ratings” in order to crack a joke about the network being “forced to pay me” $16 million to settle Trump’s defamation suit last year.

CNN has reached out to a spokesperson for Christie for comment.

Trump on Monday deflected on a question about whether he plans to investigate Christie over Bridgegate, but appeared to give the green light to the Department of Justice to open a probe.

“I don’t know, if they want to look at it. It’s not for me. If they want to look at it, they can. You could ask Pam,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, referring to Attorney General Pam Bondi. “I think we have other things to do, but I always thought he got away with murder.”

Christie and Trump have a long and rocky relationship. The former governor endorsed Trump after dropping out of the 2016 presidential primary and became a close adviser to the president. Following Trump’s defeat and subsequent attempt to overturn the 2020 election, Christie sought to establish himself as one of Trump’s chief Republican critics and ran against him in the 2024 GOP primary.

Two former officials linked to Christie’s office were found guilty on all charges in connection with the Bridgegate scandal. The Supreme Court threw out the convictions in 2020, and Trump at the time tweeted his congratulations to Christie, then a close ally.

“Congratulations to former Governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie, and all others involved, on a complete and total exoneration (with a 9-0 vote by the U.S. Supreme Court) on the Obama DOJ Scam referred to as ‘Bridgegate,’” the president tweeted.

Trump’s Sunday comments come days after his administration reopened a probe into the president’s former national security adviser-turned-critic Bolton over whether he disclosed classified information in a 2020 book. The move immediately drew criticism that Trump was using the muscle of the US government to target a political foe, though the specific basis for the searches was not clear.

Trump attacks ABC and NBC

Over an hour after Trump’s initial post on Sunday, he returned to Truth Social to attack ABC News, this time roping in NBC News to claim the networks “give me 97% BAD STORIES” and baselessly call them “AN ARM OF THE DEMOCRAT PARTY.” The president then claimed that, “ACCORDING TO MANY,” both networks should “HAVE THEIR LICENSES REVOKED BY THE FCC.”

“I would be totally in favor of that because they are so biased and untruthful, an actual threat to our Democracy,” Trump added.

An hour later, he continued the threats, writing that ABC and NBC “should lose their Licenses for their unfair coverage of Republicans and/or Conservatives, but at a minimum, they should pay up BIG for having the privilege of using the most valuable airwaves anywhere at anytime!!! Crooked ‘journalism’ should not be rewarded, it should be terminated!!!”

Trump’s calls for the FCC to strip the networks of their broadcasting licenses come as the agency, under chair Brendan Carr, has reopened investigations into complaints of media bias against ABC, NBC and CBS. In the final days of the Biden administration, Carr’s predecessor had dismissed the probes, but Carr, a Trump loyalist, reopened them after taking office.

ABC did not immediately respond to a request for comment. NBC declined to comment.

CNN’s Elise Hammond contributed to this report.

This story has been updated with additional information.

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