In an appearance Sunday morning on ABC This Week, former New Jersey governor Chris Christie condemned Donald Trump for his extraordinarily dismal record of backing losing GOP candidates in the 2022 midterm elections.
When This Week host Martha Raddatz asked Christie about the former President’s influence in the Republican Party moving forward, Christie was not shy about placing the blame squarely on Trump’s shoulders. (Watch the video below.)
“Well, I’ve said over and over again that he can’t win a general election,” Christie explained to Raddatz about Trump.
“And that’s not speculation. That’s based on the polling that I was privy to pre-the 2020 election. And what we saw actually happen in the 2020 election. And it’s only gotten worse since then,” Christie continued.
According to Christie, Republicans lost statewide races around the country in the 2022 midterms due to the subpar quality of their candidates.
“The election deniers losing across the country,” Christie said. “Bad candidates like Mastriano in Pennsylvania dragging the entire Pennsylvania ticket down in a historic way. Kari Lake, Blake Masters, Tim Michels, Tudor Jones [Dixon]. We could go down the entire list. Loser, loser, loser, loser.”
All these candidates were endorsed by Donald Trump.
Christie has been a constant source of flip-flopping talking points since losing his failed bid for the presidency in 2016. The Republican former governor’s own campaign lasted just seven short months – from June 2015 until February of the next year when he jumped on board the Trump bandwagon as a close advisor.
The MAGA-adjacent politician has been on a rehab tour since Trump’s ousting in 2020, in an attempt to cultivate a more centrist political following amid speculation that he plans to throw his hat in the 2024 presidential contest ring.
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In recent months, Christie has been vocal in his rebuke of Trump and the MAGA infiltration of right-wing politics.
At a GOP governor meeting in November, Christie received robust applause from the crowd after blaming Donald Trump for Republican candidate losses in the past three election cycles.
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As a former chair of the Republican Governors Association, Christie pointed out the drop in the number of GOP governors in office — from 31 to 26 in the past few years of Trumpism-dominated politics.
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Chris Christie certainly isn’t wrong about Trump’s toxicity as an endorser and as a candidate, but the reversal of his previous support for the disgraced former president seems a bit too opportunistic and belated to give him much credit for any deep-seated revisionist political values.
You can watch an excerpt of Chris Christie’s appearance on ABC This Week in the video below.
Original reporting by David Edwards at Alternet.
Follow Ty Ross on Twitter @cooltxchick
