This week also marks ten years since the now infamous lane closures at the George Washington Bridge, better known as Bridgegate, where staff members and political appointees over then Governor Chris Christie colluded to shut down lanes of traffic at the main toll plaza in Fort Lee.

It was punishment for a long time Mayor Mark Sokolich, because he refused to endorse Christie's reelection bid.

While the chaos prompted an investigation which ultimately derailed many of Christie's political ambitions, including his first run for the presidency in 2016.

Senior political correspondent David Cruz reports on how this part of Christie's tainted legacy could affect his second shot at the White House.

The biggest mistake I made in public life was that I put a few people into a position of authority at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, who went on a frolicking detour to divert traffic off the George Washington Bridge.

On the campaign trail these days, former Governor Chris Christie usually brings up the GWB scandal on his own.

Owning it in a buck stops here kind of way, but still ten years later insisting he had nothing to do with the plan hatched by former Christie Port Authority fixers David Wildstein and Bill Baroni.

That's them with Christie on the first day of the lane closures in 2013 to punish Fort Lee mayor Democrat Mark Sokolich for not supporting Christie's reelection that year.

Well New Jersey Democrats have been asking questions about who caused those traffic delays on the George Washington Bridge.

A joint committee led by Democrats opened hearings into the matter and immediately got the sense that the so-called traffic study Bill Baroni claimed was suspect.

Lawmakers who had been granted subpoena power to look into unrelated matters at the Port Authority soon dug in.

Former Assemblyman John Wisniewski co-chaired the joint committee with then Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, That testimony was so over-the-top, so inflammatory, so aggressive towards the members that it stood out as this is there's really something here more than meets the eye.

And that was the tip off.

Then there was the infamous time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee email that set off a frenzy of hearings and ultimately federal indictments of Baroni and Christie aide Bridget Kelly.

Loretta Weinberg remembers a report commissioned by Christie and paid for by taxpayers that A. mostly exonerated him and B. painted Kelly as the woman scorned who greenlighted the caper.

When it ended up insinuating that Bridget Anne Kelly was dissed by her boyfriend and therefore closed lanes on the George Washington Bridge.

That was something thing that really sent me over that one.

In the end, Baroni and Kelly were found guilty based largely on testimony from Wildstein, who made a deal with prosecutors Their convictions were later overturned.

It took Kelly years to rehabilitate her reputation, but the jury, as it were, is still out on whether the scandal will have cost Chris Christie a shot at the presidency.

And nobody to talk about Bridgegate there either.

They either hate Chris Christie because he doesn't like Trump.

Right.

Or they love Chris Christie because he doesn't like Trump.

It is not at all in any sense believable within the hierarchy of the New Jersey governor's office that there was a group of people that were freelancing and doing stuff the governor didn't know about.

I think it helped cost him the presidency because he came with that baggage.

As for Mark Sokolich, the target of the whole Bridgegate scheme, has it cost him the presidency?

And does a little part of you say, good?

No, I don't think I was jumping up and down that it cost him the presidency.

Was there a part of me that said you deserved it?

Yeah, certainly.

Certainly.

For the record, Christie got 60% of the vote in Fort Lee that year.

And Mark Sokolich up for reelection next year, is currently the longest serving mayor in Fort Lee history.

Chris Christie is still polling around 1% in national polls.

I'm David Cruz, NJ Spotlight News