Chris Christie said he will never support Donald Trump again — even though he is the 2024 Republican presidential nominee.
Christie is one of several Republicans seeking a candidate for the GOP nomination, and has become one of the party’s most outspoken anti-Trump voices in recent years.
‘I can’t help him. No way, Christie said Axios when asked if he would support Trump in the case of him being the party’s nominee in 2024. He noted that the 76-year-old ex-president is simply too old and out of touch.
“Look, I just can’t,” Christie added. “If you have the January 6 choir at a rally and you show a video of it — I just don’t think that person is fit for the presidency.”
Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie said he will never support ex-President Donald Trump again — even if he wins the 2024 Republican nomination. “Look, I just can’t,” he told Axios
His harsh rebuke of the former president comes despite the fact that the Republican National Committee likely requires all candidates who want to be on the debate stage to sign a pledge to support whoever wins the nomination.
Christie, a former governor of New Jersey, is seriously considering running for president and returned to New Hampshire on Tuesday.
It is clear that if he makes a bid, Christie will focus on taking out former President Trump.
“See, what I thought in 2016 was that [Trump] will be the nominee, and I don’t want Hillary Clinton to be the president,” Christie said of his previous support for Trump.
‘Was I worried about him? Sure, but in the end you’re probably worrying about a candidate other than yourself.”
Christie’s support for Trump lasted until the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
The former governor said he would not vote for Biden in 2024 either.
“I also can’t imagine voting for Joe Biden,” he told Axios. “I don’t know if I can vote for any of these guys. They are both too old. They are both out of touch with what is happening in the world right now.’
Christie spoke for nearly two hours Tuesday at a town hall-style event in Manchester at St. Anselm College’s New Hampshire Institute of Politics.
Christie returned to New Hampshire on Tuesday as he ponders a 2024 presidential bid aimed at knocking out Trump
Christie, a Republican presidential candidate in 2016, spoke for nearly two hours at a town hall-style event in Manchester at St. Anselm College’s New Hampshire Institute of Politics
He recalled how in 2016 he effectively knocked Florida Senator Marco Rubio out of the presidential campaign by embarrassing him on a debate stage in Granite State.
“You better have somebody on that stage who can do to him what I did to Marco, because that’s the only thing that’s going to beat Donald Trump,” Christie countered. “So you have to think about who has the skill to do that and who has the guts to do it, because it’s not going to end well.”
“Whatever happens, his end will not be a calm and quiet conclusion,” the former Garden State governor added.
Christie kind of beat Trump around when the two were rivals during the 2016 campaign, but he ended up backing the now-former president after the governor of New Jersey was creamed by Trump and others in New Hampshire’s first primary.
Christie was then hired to lead the Trump transition should he win, but once Trump did, the governor was replaced by Vice President Mike Pence.
Still, Christie advised Trump throughout his four years in office.
But he was also among the droves of Republicans who broke with Trump over his denial of the 2020 election and his role in the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
Unlike some of those Republicans, Christie never came back crawling. If he makes a presidential bid, it will aim to be anti-Trump.
A decision would be made in the next 60 to 90 days, he said Tuesday.
“June is probably the last month you can go, and then you have to get in. But I also said there’s no damn compelling reason to make it sooner,” he said.