PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Chris Christie won the endorsement Wednesday of Maine Gov. Paul LePage, the first Republican governor to announce a pick in the presidential race and an outspoken leader who called Christie "the real deal."

Christie set aside a morning event in New Hampshire and detoured to Maine to pick up the endorsement, announced under a leaking tent on the deck of Becky's Diner.

"He's not gonna be a politician and talk out of both sides of his mouth," LePage said of the New Jersey governor, who opened his 2016 campaign a day earlier. "What he's gonna do is tell you things you may not want to hear but you need to hear. And then he's gonna go to work to fix them."

LePage also praised Christie's recent chairmanship of the Republican Governors Association. The group was instrumental in helping LePage win re-election, pouring more than $5 million into the race.

"When all of you and your colleagues around the country had me as dead-walking governor, Chris Christie had faith," he said, meaning the press.

LePage and Christie share an aggressive leadership style and a tendency to shoot from the hip, sometimes to their benefit and sometimes not. They've both had brushes with scandal, too.

LePage is facing questions about whether he inappropriately used public money to hurt one of his political opponents. Democratic House Speaker Mark Eves says LePage forced a school for at-risk youth to fire him from the top job there by threatening to withhold more than $500,000 a year in state funds.

A legislative panel is deciding whether he should face an abuse-of-power investigation from the state's watchdog agency.

Christie dismissed the matter, saying he had full faith in his fellow governor.

Christie's reputation was damaged by a political payback scandal in which former top aides were charged with creating politically motivated traffic jams at a bridge to retaliate against a Democratic mayor who declined to endorse Christie's re-election. Christie denies he had anything to do with it, and no evidence has emerged to refute that.

Christie declared his candidacy for the 2016 GOP nomination at a rally at his old high school in New Jersey Tuesday and went directly to the early-voting state of New Hampshire, which is seen as crucial to his pathway forward. He's going back to the state for more events.

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Associated Press writer Alanna Durkin contributed to this report from Augusta, Maine.

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