Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) on Sunday said the House GOP’s jeering at President Biden during the State of the Union address last week was a “big mistake” by the party.
“Big mistake. Look, you know, you don’t want to — you don’t want to rise to the bait, and they did, a number of them did, and it was a big mistake,” Christie told host George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s “This Week.”
Republican lawmakers booed and heckled the president at points during Biden’s sweeping speech to a joint session of Congress, with an eruption of dissent as Biden said some in the GOP want to sunset Medicare and Social Security.
“Look, the better response would have been to respond to that with laughter. If you really wanted to respond to the president saying something as ridiculous as the Republicans [want to sunset the programs], because of what one Republican said, Rick Scott, which was immediately rejected by almost the entire rest of the party, what they should have done was just laughed at the president then, and moved on,” Christie said.
“The yelling and the screaming stuff, look, I think that’s always bad. It doesn’t get you anywhere. And it gave Joe Biden an opportunity to engage them back in a way that was spontaneous, that I think was probably the best part of his entire speech,” the former governor added.
Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) shook his head dismissively as he sat behind Biden, beside Vice President Harris. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) stood to shout “liar” at the president when he made references to GOP cuts in Social Security.
Biden played off the audience’s audible dissent in improvised lines mid-speech.
“So folks, as we all apparently agree, Social Security and Medicare is off the books now, right?” Biden said. “Alright,” he added, throwing a thumbs-up.