Former Gov. Chris Christie (R-NJ) met with dozens “of his former staffers and advisors” on Monday night, telling them he is continuing to mull a 2024 run.
Christie and “more than three dozen of his former staffers and advisors” convened at Mission in Dupont Circle in Washington, DC, Politico reported.
“If we go forward, we want all of you to be with us,” Christie told them. “Thank you to all of you for everything you’ve already done for us. It’s been really, really an amazing ride. And you know what? It might not just be over yet.”
He would mark the fifth candidate to enter the Republican Primary, which already includes former President Donald Trump, former Gov. Nikki Haley (R-SC), anti-woke businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, and former Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R-AR).
For now, he joins the ranks of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) and Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), who are flirting with White House bids though they have not yet announced candidacies.
Christie, a former Trump ally turned staunch critic, took a swipe at the presidency in 2016 in a deeply crowded field. He failed to secure a single delegate, placing tenth, along with the likes of former Gov. Jim Gilmore (R-VA) and former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA).
He has been highly critical of Trump, the GOP front-runner with more than 50 percent of support in much of the latest polling in recent years. In February 2022, he said that Trump “incited” the January 6 riot at the United States capitol, only to walk his comments back the next day when pressed by Hugh Hewitt on his eponymously named radio show, as Breitbart News reported.
Christie also said the FBI had had “no choice” but to carry out the raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in its documents probe while appearing on ABC’s “This Week” in September.
In February, he took aim at Trump over the 2020 election, stating that despite President Joe Biden’s flaws as a candidate, he was “running against someone … who was so toxic that he won anyway.”
While he has volleyed criticisms at the GOP front-runner, he is also setting his sights on DeSantis, who has consistently polled as the second-strongest candidate. Speaking with Semafor on Tuesday, Christie suggested DeSantis has been outflanked in his battle with Disney:
“That’s not the guy I want sitting across from President Xi and negotiating our next agreement with China, or sitting across from Putin and trying to resolve what’s happening in Ukraine, if you can’t see around a corner that [Disney CEO] Bob Iger created for you,” Christie said.
Christie also voiced his disapproval of DeSantis’s conflict with Disney in general, stating, “I don’t think we should be heavily regulating business.”
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