Christie chasing career makeover while financial mess remains unresolved

Now, after Christie hit a record-low approval rating and was snubbed by President-elect Donald Trump for an administration post, he has what may be his last opportunity to rehabilitate a take-charge image.

With a year left in his term, he’s up against a worsening pension-funding crisis, which has contributed to a record 10 credit-rating downgrades under his watch and for which he’s offered no recent solutions. Instead, he unsuccessfully pushed bills to let him profit from a book deal while in office and pull legal advertising from struggling newspapers.

“The political roads to Washington have been closed off to him,” said Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute in West Long Branch, New Jersey. “What kind of Christie are we going to get: the Christie of the past two years or the Christie that burst onto the scene in 2010?”