Brad Joseph, Fan Who Was Yelled At By Chris Christie At Baseball Game, Shares His Story

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is having a rough relationship with sports this month. While hosting a New York sports-radio show in early July, several of his constituents called into complain. In response, Christie called one of them a “bum.” Then, later in the month, Christie was booed relentlessly by the entire stadium at the New York Mets’ Citi Field after catching a foul ball.

Most recently, Christie engaged in a fiery exchange with a Cubs fan in Milwaukee, after the fan called him a hypocrite and told him that he sucks. After being heckled, Christie leaned down to the seated fan, Brad Joseph, got with in inches of his face, and asked him if he felt like a “tough guy.”

Christie, speaking with CNN’s Jake Tapper, defended his reaction.

“When somebody swears at you publicly, and says some really awful things with a lot of children sitting around and my own son with me, I took it the first time he said it, and yelled it from about 15 yards and said some really lousy, awful stuff. And then I came back after having ignored it the first time and he went in for seconds,” Christie said.

“If you go in for seconds – I’ve always said this, whether it was at my town hall meetings or anything else – if you give it, you’re going to get it back.”

Joseph, who seemed to regret his words slightly, took to Facebook to share his side of the story.

“He came a few inches from my face and began to call me a “big shot,” and a “tough guy,” and asking “what are you gonna do now?” Joseph wrote on Monday.

“He was close enough that I could feel his breath on my face as he shouted at me. He never denied being a hypocrite. Then, his right foot stepped well outside of the aisle and into our row, and he began to hit my leg with his knee in an aggressive fashion.”

Joseph later wrote that Christie’s security detail confronted him afterwards. The Cubs fan theorizes in the post that the Governor was trying to get a rise out of him in order to get him arrested.

“I’m not proud of my behavior today and I regret shouting “you suck!” at Christie. So Chris, if you’re reading this, I’m sorry,” the fan wrote. “What I do not regret is calling Chris Christie a hypocrite. This is a man who made a career out of demonizing public corruption only to become exactly what he denounced.”

Joseph also mentioned that he was a Trump voter and is a conservative. Still, his distain for Christie stems from the fact that the two-term governor has, on multiple occasions, seemingly been involved in corruption scandals.

In 2013, Christie was among the accused during the George Washington Bridge scandal, in which political appointees of Christie’s colluded to cause traffic jams on the bridge, potentially putting many people in danger. Christie was not found guilty.

During the Fourth of July weekend this year, Christie was spotted lounging on a beach closed due to a government shut-down, which he called for. It sunk his approval ratting in his home state to a miserable 13 percent.