Chris Christie recently resorted to the sort of political name-calling that former President Donald Trump was so effective at, calling the 45th president a “liar and a coward” for misleading his supporters on his recent indictment over alleged mishandling of classified documents via Media Ite.
The former New Jersey Governor, and once close political ally to Trump, appeared on CNN’s State of the Union and was asked to opine on a clip of Trump saying at a rally, “Every time the radical left Democrats, Marxists, communists, and fascists indict me, I consider it to be a great badge of honor and courage. I’m doing it for you. I’m being indicted for you. Better me than you. Right?”
“Badge of honor and courage. Better me than you,” host Jake Tapper repeated before asking, “What do you make of that?”
Christie did not demur in reply, saying:
He’s a liar and a coward. He’s not giving interviews for anyone other than because of his own conduct. There’s no other of the 200 million Americans you spoke about who illegally retained classified national secrets after being asked politely, quietly and professionally for 18 months to voluntarily turn them back over after he left the White House. There’s no other of those 200 million Americans who lied to their own lawyers about where those documents were. And there’s none of those other 200 million Americans who lied to the prosecutors about it and flashed around documents regarding an Iranian war plan to people who didn’t have the clearance to see them. Look, he’s indicted because of his outrageous conduct, and that’s why he’s been indicted. He now has the opportunity to go to court and make the government proves that case beyond a reasonable doubt. But now he says he doesn’t want to have a trial until after the election in 2024. I don’t think he’s doing that for us either. He should resolve this thing before people vote so that we know exactly who we’re voting for to put behind the desk in the Oval Office when he says he’s doing it for us. That’s a lie. And what he was doing, all the things that he was doing with those documents, it shows exactly what a coward he is.
Since announcing his candidacy for the GOP nomination, Christie has made attacking Trump, and his record, a campaign focus, which has seen his poll numbers rise from single digits to … bigger single digits. Nonetheless, Christie has proved his merits since announcing his campaign that he earned a spot in the first GOP primary debate, which Trump seems likely to skip.
This is another issue Christie has laid into Trump, or at least his Super Pac has evidenced by a new campaign that Tapper showed to Christie, ostensibly for the first time, which concludes with “The indictments bring up how you lost to Joe Biden. So, Donald, you need to decide, are you a chicken or just a loser?”
