(TheLastPatriotNews.com) – Chris Christie, the former GOP governor of New Jersey, has told an audience in New Hampshire he would be the only Republican presidential nomination contender to stand up to Donald Trump.
Christie recently said he was mulling a candidacy for the 2024 GOP nomination. He ran for the nomination unsuccessfully in 2016 and ended up endorsing Trump.
The two-term governor of New Jersey was also part of the Trump administration and the 2020 Trump campaign.
In a Monday town hall-type event at St. Anselm College in Goffstown, New Hampshire, Christie touted a presidential debate exchange with Florida US Senator Marco Rubio.
When Rubio stumbled over an answer, Christie attacked him as inexperienced.
“There it is — the memorized 25-second speech,” the latter said at the time.
The former governor told the Goffstown crowd that he could topple Donald Trump.
“You better have somebody on that stage who can do to [Trump] what I did to Marco, because that’s the only thing that’s going to defeat Donald Trump,” Christie declared.
“And that means you have to be fearless because he will come back and right at you,” he added, as cited by The New York Post.
According to Christie, other declared or potential bidders for the 2024 GOP nomination lack the backbone to stand up to Trump and call him out.
In his words, those include Nikki Haley, the former US ambassador to the UN who is already an official candidate, plus potential rivals in the face of Florida’s Governor Ron DeSantis and former Vice President Mike Pence.
“[A race against Trump] is not going to end nicely, no matter what. His end will not be a calm and quiet conclusion,” Christie stated.
Even though he bested Rubio in the 2016 presidential debate, Christie ended up with 7% of the vote in the New Hampshire primary, behind five other candidates.
Despite his collaboration with Trump during the latter’s White House term, the two fell out over the January 6 events at the US Capitol and have been at odds since.
“Donald Trump said a couple of weeks ago, ‘I am your retribution.’ Guess what, everybody? No thanks. No dice. He doesn’t want to be my retribution. That’s baloney. The only person he cares about is him,” Christie told the crowd on Monday.
“When are you going to take down Trump?” asked an audience member named Saul Shriber, who said he voted for Christie in 2016.
“I have my timetable,” the former governor replied.
Shriber, 67, also expressed his disappointment that Christie backed Trump after dropping out of the 2016 nomination race.
Christie responded that he had made a “mistake.” He opined that he and the other candidates committed a “strategic error” by believing they would be better positioned to take on Trump one-on-one, but their campaigns ended prematurely.
“None of us knew what kind of president he really would be or not,” Christie said.
“I did,” Shriber responded.
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