A new Monmouth University poll shows New Jersey Chris Christie with a 51% to 35% approval rating.

However, the gender gap in the governor’s ratings, which closed for a short time in the fall, has widened again. Currently, 59% of men approve of Christie while 28% disapprove. Among women, approval stands at 43% and disapproval at 42%.

Politicians from both major parties say South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley’s (R) new memoir, Can’t Is Not An Option, “is untruthful or twists many events,” the Columbia State reports.

“Members of Haley’s own Republican Party — including the speaker of the S.C. House and a former lieutenant governor — say allegations against them are ‘absolutely not true’ and ‘not true at all.’ Democrats, including Haley’s 2010 opponent in the governor’s race, describe the book as ‘fiction.'”

Said one Democratic lawmaker: “This lady just makes stuff up.”

ABC News has learned that the Internal Revenue Service never conducted an investigation into South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley’s (R) involvement in a Sikh temple’s finances.

Rumors swirled in South Carolina this week that Haley might be indicted.

Wisconsin elections officials ordered a set of historic recall elections, making Gov. Scott Walker (R) the third governor in the nation to face a recall and Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch (R) the first lieutenant governor to face one, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.

Recall elections for four Republican state senators were also ordered.

Primaries will be held May 8 and general elections June 5. For races that do not require primaries, the general elections will be May 8.

Just two other governors have faced recall elections.  Both were defeated.

South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) “vehemently denied” that she is in any way connected to a tax probe of a Sikh temple where her parents are leaders, the Columbia State reports.

Said Haley: “It is flat out not true. I have never kept their books. I’ve never made deposits. I never signed checks. I never did financial statements. This is a church that I don’t go to. There are no issues related to me and that church.”

A report yesterday suggested she might soon be indicted.

Wisconsin state Sen. Pam Galloway (R), who faces a recall election this summer, plans to resign from the Senate shortly, leaving an even split between Republicans and Democrats, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports.

The recall election against Galloway would still move forward even though she would no longer occupy the seat.

Arizona Republicans are close to passing a bill which would force women trying to get reimbursed for birth control drugs through their employer-provided health plan “to prove that they are taking it for a medical reason such as acne, rather than to prevent pregnancy,” the AP reports.

Candidates for Oklahoma state or local offices would have to take a test for illegal drugs before they could file for the posts under an amendment to a bill passed by the state House of Representatives, Tulsa World reports.

“The measure was the Democrats’ response to a Republican-backed bill that would require adults receiving welfare assistance to undergo drug tests.”

Under Secret Service investigation “for sending stalker-like texts to a federal prosecutor,” Florida state Rep. Richard Steinberg (D) abruptly resigned his seat, the Miami Herald reports.

Throughout the summer, Steinberg used a disguised account to send text messages to Assistant U.S. Attorney Marlene Fernandez-Karavetsos sending “suggestive messages, calling her ‘sexxxy mama’ and asking about her infant son.”

In one of the weirdest speeches you will ever see on the floor of a legislative body, Virginia Del. David Albo (R) spoke to
his colleagues (and television cameras) about his failed attempt to
seduce his wife as a result of the contentious abortion debate in the state.

[Read more…]

Just before she resigned as Alaska’s governor, the Anchorage Daily News reports Sarah Palin “displayed growing frustrations over deteriorating relationships with state lawmakers and their perceived efforts to ‘lame duck’ her administration, along with outrage over ethics complaints that she felt frivolously targeted her and which prompted her to write: ‘I can’t take it any more.'”

“The details are included in more than 17,000 emails released Thursday by state officials — nearly three and half years after the records were first sought by several news organizations.”

The AP notes the emails also show Palin was seriously thinking of divorcing her husband in 2007.

Wisconsin state Rep. Joel Kleefisch (R) was caught on video voting on behalf of an absent lawmaker despite a rule that only the members present in the Assembly Chamber may vote.

WTMJ confronted Kleefisch who responded, “It depends on how you interpret the rule. The rule says you have to be present in the chamber. The bathroom counts as the chamber. And the parlor counts as a chamber if you are going to eat.”

[Read more…]

As a Georgia lawmakers weigh a ban on most women getting abortions 20 weeks after fertilization, Democratic lawmakers protested the move by introducing a bill that would drastically limit vasectomies, the Augusta Chronicle reports.

The bill calls for no more vasectomies that leave “thousands of children… deprived of birth.”

Said state Rep. Yasmin Neal (D): “Women’s reproductive rights are always debated. No one ever talks about the male side of the issue. We just want them to know how it feels just this once… It’s about fairness and showing how preposterous the abortion bill is.”

In a letter to fellow Republicans, Indiana state Rep. Bob Morris (R) called the Girl Scouts a “radicalized organization” that supports abortion and promotes “homosexual lifestyles,” the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette reports.

Morris said he did some research on the Internet and found “allegations that the Girl Scouts are a tactical arm of Planned Parenthood, that they allow transgender females to join, ‘just like any real girl,’ and encourage sex.”

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s (R) administration “has touted for months its efforts to balance the state budget, but now it also has acknowledged a significant way in which the budget isn’t balanced,” the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports.

“To keep the possibility alive of making further cuts to state health programs, the Walker administration quietly certified to the federal government on Dec. 29 that the state had a deficit. Federal law allows the state to drop tens of thousands of adults to save money on health care costs if the state can show it has a deficit. Walker has said he wants to cut health care spending in other ways, but
hasn’t ruled out dropping those 53,000 adults if the other methods
aren’t approved by the federal government.”

Kansas state Rep. Terri Lois Gregory (R) attempted to covertly record a private conversation with state Sen. Vicki Schmidt (R) about controversial health reforms sought by Gov. Sam Brownback (R), the Topeka Capital Journal reports.

During the meeting, Schmidt noticed a small flashing light in Gregory’s satchel. It wasn’t a telephone.

Said Schmidt: “I asked her, ‘Are you recording me?’ She said, ‘Yes.’ ”

“A bipartisan contingent of legislators said Gregory violated an unwritten code of conduct among lawmakers that frowns on clandestine recording of colleagues in closed-door meetings.”

“I don’t read newspapers in the State of Ohio.”

— Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R), explaining that it doesn’t give him “an uplifting experience.”

[Read more…]

The Wichita Eagle reports a Kansas teenager “is in trouble after mocking Gov. Sam Brownback (R) during a mock legislative assembly for high school students.”

Emma Sullivan tweeted: “Just made mean comments at gov brownback and told him he sucked, in person #heblowsalot”

“Sullivan was called to her principal’s office and told that the tweet had been flagged by someone on Brownback’s staff… Sullivan said the principal ordered her to write letters of apology to Brownback… and others.”