New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is appalled by reports that he took a snooze during a Bruce Springsteen concert earlier this month, sounding utterly horrified that anyone would suggest that he did.
Christie, a huge fan of the Boss despite their political differences, was reportedly caught sleeping, the New York Post reported, posting a photograph snapped by an anonymous source. But Christie called the picture misleading.
“What happened was,” he explained in a video posted on his Twitter account, “during ‘Rocky Ground,’ which is, like, kind of a really spiritual song, people sat, so I sat up on the seat, and I put my head back and closed my eyes and listened to the song.”
Thankfully, he said, no one took pictures of him “fist pumping” or “singing” or “contorting his body” during other Springsteen songs, though those would have shown a more complete picture.
Christie called Deborah Grammicione, his policy chief who also attended the concert, up to the microphone to vouch for him.
“At any time during the show, Deborah, did I fall asleep?” he asked.
“Absolutely not,” she replied.
The Post also reported that a member of the audience had yelled at the governor to “wake up,” but Christie said that was shouted in a different context.
“What the New York Post conflated was, earlier in the show, there’s a song called ‘Death of my Home Town’ … and Bruce did one of his little speeches beforehand, you know about the robber barons or the rich and the one percent, you know the normal Bruce stuff,” Christie recalled, “and at that time, somebody who was apparently not a political supporter of mine, yelled from a few rows back: ‘Hear that? Wake up, Governor. Wake up.'”
“The joker who took the picture,” Christie said, had combined the two incidents.
“I have NEVER fallen asleep during a Bruce Springsteen show,” Christie concluded, sounding horrified at the thought. “I will never fall asleep during a Bruce Springsteen show.”
The concert was the 127th Springsteen show that Christie attended.