Romney Campaign Denies The Reason Christie Wasn’t Romney’s Vice Presidential Nominee

The reason Chris Christie was not Mitt Romney's Vice Presidential nominee was he did not believe Mitt Romney could win in November and did not want to step down as Governor of New Jersey in order to run according to a report in the New York Post and denied by the Romney campaign and Christie.

“It’s just completely false,” Christie told  PolitickerNJ.com. “They both have my phone number and neither one ever called me. I was never offered the vice presidency so a factor in me not taking it was never thinking he could not win. Both (reporters Josh Margolin and Beth DeFalco) have long-term relationships with me. If they picked up the phone” (he would have tried to persuade them not to write the story).

"From my perspective, the story is inaccurate," Bill Palatucci, Christie's closest adviser told the Star Ledger and called it "crazy" that Christie didn't believe all along that Romney would win.

Russ Schriefer told Fox News that he personally spoke with Christie, who called the story "totally untrue."

According to the Post story, if Romney were to name Christie as the Vice Presidential nominee, the Romney campaign demanded that he give up his office so that pay-to-play laws would not be an issue for banks that do business with the Garden State to contribute to Romney.

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Christie also had doubts at one point that Romney could win because of the controversy about Romney not releasing more than two years worth of tax returns and several gaffes on his overseas trip in July.

There was pressure from within the Christie camp for him to reconsider. “There were people around him that wanted him to reconsider, to actually push to be vice president. But he’s known there are real issues here. Chris knows the score,” the source told the Post.