Chris Christie on Budget & Economy

To make budget deal, must get leadership talking in one room

A: The first thing is that the president had to get involved personally. And what I found in New Jersey, was there is no substitute for the three leaders in the room having to look at each other and having to hash this out. And everybody's got to put skin in the game. I mean, I gave on things that I wanted. Obviously, the Democratic Senate president and the Democratic speaker gave on things they wanted, and we came to a compromise that didn't violate our principles. And that's the key. You can't ask people to violate their principles. And so there has to be a way to find principled outcome where people are also compromising. And what the specifics of that's going to be are going to be up to the president, the speaker and Sen. Reid. But they need to get in the room and finish this off.