Christie said legalizing marijuana will likely be “priority No. 1” if a Democrat wins the governorship.

“People like Nick Scutari and Steve Sweeney and Phil Murphy want to bring this poison, legalized, into this state under the premise that, well, it doesn’t matter because people can buy it illegally anyway,” Christie said. “Then why not legalize heroin? I mean, their argument fails just on that basis. Let’s legalize cocaine. Let’s legalize angel dust. Let’s legalize all of it. What’s the difference? Let everybody choose.”

The governor, who has often warned that marijuana is a gateway to harder substances, said the “latest data” shows a child who tries marijuana between the ages of 12 and 17 is 10 times more likely to be a heroin addict by the time he is 24.

Christie’s office said the data was culled from the 2013 National Survey on Drug Use and Health.

Scutari argued that marijuana is actually being used to treat opioid abuse.