Chris Christie for President Rumors Soar After NJ Governor Post Sandy Approval Rating Bump

Fresh off his NBC's Saturday Night Live debut, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is scoring some points in the blue state polls because of his handling of Hurricane Sandy.  

A National Research Inc. poll shows the outspoken governor with 77% approval rating in the deeply blue state (New Jersey has 750,000 more Democrats than Republicans, and President Obama was re-elected by a healthy double-digit margin of 17 points).    

In addition, a Quinnipiac University poll of New York City residents found that Christie was the leader who best handled the storm, with 36% of respondents thinking he did the best recovery job, versus 22% who thought Obama did, 15% for New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and 12% for New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.   

Christie was a favorite to throw his hat in the 2012 presidential ring, but he declined in order to continue his job as governor of the Garden State. He went on to become the 2012 Republican National Convention Keynote Speaker, a role in which he was criticized for speaking too much about himself and too little about then Republican nominee to be Mitt Romney. 

The New Jersey governor, adored among conservatives because of his brash and unapologetic attacks on unions, then became a top Romney surrogate making appearances along the candidate on the campaign trail and being deployed to the top political shows where he promoted Romney's candidacy the best he could (one brilliant moment was when he predicted Romney, who had just been castigated by his own 47% remarks, would win the  first presidential debate).   

But with just hours leading to Election Day, Christie fell from grace among Romney aides when he rose above partisanship and praised President Obama's response to Hurricane Sandy. "I don't give a damn about the election right now," was Christie's response while surveying the storm's devastation along the legendary Jersey Shore.