Christie picks up 2016 endorsement from Maryland governor

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s presidential campaign is kicking off its fundraising operation next month at the Asbury Convention Center.

Christie, who has advocated treating drug addiction as a disease, also called for mandatory drug courts across the country. “We got illegal guns off the streets, prosecuted gang members and stopped terrorist plots against Fort Dix and Newark Airport”.

Analysts say Christie has plenty of time before the primaries to increase his poll numbers, which are in the cellar compared with Republican front-runners Jeb Bush and Donald Trump. On Thursday, he also became the first sitting president to see the inside of a federal prison, visiting the El Reno Federal Correctional Institution in Oklahoma. The president is touring a federal prison in Oklahoma Thursday, and gave a speech Tuesday that called for the Justice Department to investigate the use of solitary confinement. Wallace Custis, a program director for Face Forward 2, which seeks to deter troubled youth from becoming adult offenders told msnbc he liked Christie’s message of giving Americans “a second chance”. “Justice is something we have to build in our communities,” Christie said.

Christie has given a series of policy speeches in recent weeks to separate himself from the Republican pack, which includes 15 announced candidates so far.

The state’s reduction in crime has been hailed by others, including President Obama, who touted new limits on the flow of military-style equipment to local law enforcement during a speech there in May.

“Some irresponsible leaders love to find scapegoats or ride each wave of public outrage to support their narrow ideological goals”, Christie said in his latest policy address. “It’s always easier to blame the cops, or guns, or a lack of government spending”.

“If Congress decides to revisit this, I don’t know necessarily that retroactivity is the right way to go, because what it does is force the judicial system to go and revisit every one of those cases – and we’re talking about thousands and thousands of cases”, Christie said.