Chris Christie expected to pick up endorsements Tuesday

Gov. Chris Christie says he will not consider legislation raising the state’s gasoline tax unless lawmakers reduce other taxes.

Christie can also count on support from Danny Elwell, who owns one of the largest real estate companies in Iowa; Gary Kirke and Mike Richards, two of the state’s most influential businessmen; former state senator Jim Kersten, and Mikel Derby, a longtime Iowa activist and a legislative liason for the Department of Transportation.

Christie has said all options are on the table when it comes to the fund that pays for road and bridge projects.

Christie’s comments to the New Jersey Commerce and Industry Association in Morris County come as he seeks the Republican Party nomination for president and as the state’s transportation trust fund threatens to run out of money. The state’s inheritance tax tops out at 16 percent.

“We’re putting together a winning organization”, Christie said”.

Potentially complicating a deal with Democrats is Christie’s decision last month to sign the antitax group Americans for Tax Reform’s pledge to “oppose and veto any and all efforts to increase taxes”.

Christie appears to be boxed in on the transportation-funding issue, with New Jersey’s 14.5-cent gas tax – the second-lowest among US states – generating only enough revenue to pay off the state Transportation Trust Fund’s significant debt through June 30, 2016, the end of the current fiscal year. Prieto supports a gas tax increase and said he is open to considering cuts in the estate tax, even possibly phasing it out over time.

“All you would be doing is digging New Jersey into a deeper hole”, said Gordon MacInnes, the president of the think tank, during a conference call yesterday morning.

“The fact that this is at the top of legislators’ to-do list is bad news for nearly all the Garden State’s working families”, Whiten said.

“While New Jersey’s estate and inheritance taxes probably merit a reevaluation, such an assessment should only be carried out in a broader discussion of state revenues and expenditures. Tax fairness for the people of New Jersey”, he said. He said he’s tracked Internal Revenue Service data that shows more than $10 billion in wealth has left the state since the estate tax was decoupled from the federal version of the tax, which has a much higher exemption of $5.43 million.

The transfer inheritance tax imposes a levy on a few beneficiaries of assets provided by a decedent.