Big ticket: Cost to protect Gov. Christie rises 1,800 percent
http://watchdog.org/192129/christie-protect-cost/
No matter who pays for Chris Christies ticket to todays Dallas Cowboys vs. Green Bay Packers football game, the New Jersey governor will be running up the score on taxpayers.
The travel costs of state police troopers assigned to protect the governor are 18 times higher than when Christie took office, a New Jersey Watchdog investigation found.
New Jersey spent nearly $1 million on travel expenses for its state police Executive Protection Unit during Christies four years and nine months as governor, according to documents obtained under the Open Public Records Act. Last year, Christie traveled out-of-state on more than 100 days while visiting 36 states, Mexico and Canada, primarily on personal and political trips that were not official state business.
The current average monthly travel costs to protect Christie for a single month are 50 percent more than former Gov. Jon Corzines entire final year in office, according to state records. For 2009, EPUs expenses were only $21,704 compared to $32,933 per month for the first three quarters of 2014.
Spokesmen for Christie did not respond to New Jersey Watchdogs requests for comment.
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It's the entourage, baby.