Chris Christie Takes A Low Blow At Trump's Family
Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) officially launched his 2024 presidential campaign on Tuesday and wasted no time taking aim at former President Donald Trump.
Christie, who previously served as U.S Attorney for New Jersey and briefly chaired Trump's transition team, quickly set his sights on the former president by reiterating a litany of broken promises while speaking with a group of voters in New Hampshire.
"Beware, because that leader not only will not serve you, they will not be able to find anybody who will serve them. And a lonely, self-consumed, self-serving mirror hog is not a leader," Christie said, referring to Trump. "Let me be clear, in case I have not been already, the person I am talking about who is obsessed with the mirror, who never admits a mistake, who never admits a fault, and will always find someone else and something else to blame for whatever goes wrong, but finds every reason to take credit for anything that goes right, is Donald Trump."
Christie’s pointed case against Trump:
“let me be clear…the person I am talking about who is obsessed with the mirror, who never admits a mistakes, who never admits a fault…is Donald Trump.“ pic.twitter.com/GQ7OTQktqn— Alex Thompson (@AlexThomp) June 6, 2023
Christie went on to criticize Trump for his failure to build the Mexico-U.S border wall, one of the former president's central 2016 campaign promises.
Trump fired back at Christie's announcement with a post on social media Wednesday morning, saying "Does he have a psychological problem with SIZE? Actually, his speech was SMALL, and not very good. It rambled all over the place, and nobody had a clue of what he was talking about."
Christie's launch was quickly followed by analysis from pollster Steve Kornacki, who suggested Monday that the former Governor faces the "steepest hill" of any of the 2024 GOP candidates in order to become the party's nominee. Still, Kornacki said that Christie could do substantial damage to Trump, much like the way he knocked Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) out of the 2016 presidential race.
Republican strategist Mike Murphy echoed Kornacki's sentiment during an interview earlier this month, saying that Christie's campaign "effectively [is] lighting a stick of dynamite and running right at Donald Trump."
It appears that Christie is taking Murphy's words to heart, and it remains to be seen how successful the former Governor will be in his efforts to challenge the 45th president. Nevertheless, it appears that if Christie's campaign picks up more steam, there could be fireworks in the Republican primary.