Republican Presidential candidate Chris Christie made a case to disgruntled New Hampshire Democrats and Independents wanting to unseat former President Trump as the likely GOP nominee for the 2024 presidential election.
“Vote in the Republican primary, baby,” he said last week. “We’re the only game in town, and we’re the only way to stop Donald Trump.”
Christie has focused nearly all of his campaign efforts on New Hampshire, with the hopes that a strong performance there could solidify him as a legitimate anti-Trump candidate.
The former New Jersey governor faces stark polls that show him to be unpopular among both Republicans and Democrats, but New Hampshire primary polling suggests that his support there could reach double digits — though still far behind Trump.
Once a Trump ally and 2016 campaign surrogate, Christie is now one of Trump’s biggest critics in the 2024 race. The pair have repeatedly gone back and forth with personal insults and on policy.
A new campaign presentation from the Christie team argues he has the best shot at taking down the former president.
“As the only campaign taking Trump on directly, we plan to break last. And by running … lean efficiently now, Christie will have the resources necessary to seize the opportunity when it arrives,” the presentation reads. “The goal is to outlast.”
Christie’s team argued that other candidates’ strategies — which it described as “get to [Trump’s] right, run as [his] clone, ignore him, try to please everyone” — aren’t working.
“The majority of the people in this party don’t want Trump to be the nominee,” Christie said. “It’s a matter of who’s going to be able to catch their attention and their excitement to coalesce the opposition. And that’s what the next few months are going to be all about.”
“I am the cavalry,” he continued. “That’s the biggest reason I got in the race. … I was like, no one’s gonna take him on.”
Christie has said he’s qualified for the third debate in Miami next week. Trump, who will once again skip the event, is set to hold a rally in Florida at the same time as his primary opponents take the stage.
National polling averages put Christie at about 2.4 percent in the Republican primary, behind former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley at 7.7 percent and Florida Gov. DeSantis at 14 percent — while Trump leads with 58.3 percent.