Chris Christie’s Iowa Goal: Beat Jeb And Jon Kasich

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie wants to be the governor in the presidential race who earns the most support when Iowans caucus this evening.

“We’ve always thought that what we want to be the number one governor coming out of these two races,” Christie said in an interview on Morning Joe this morning. “If we beat Jeb Bush, John Kasich, Mike Huckabee, we’re the number one governor left, that moves us to the future races and so that’s always been our goal.”

With Gov. Scott Walker, and Gov. Bobby Jindal out of the race, Christie is now polling close to the remaining governors in the race.

The final Des Moines Register poll shows Christie at three percent in the state – while Kasich, Bush, and Huckabee were at two.

“We’re ahead of Jeb Bush, and he spent 20 times the amount of money – maybe 30 times the amount of money we spent here,” Christie said. He argued that he was focusing on connecting with voters a on a personal level.

Christie is hosting three campaign events in Iowa this morning, before heading out to New Hampshire for a series of town halls.

In New Hampshire’s CNN/WMUR poll, Christie is polling at eight percent while Kasich is at nine and Bush is at six.

Christie previewed what it would take to drop out of the race, at a time of his own choosing.

“I’m going to stay in the race as long as I think I have a chance to win. I’m not one of these guys who’s running for president as a vanity exercise,” he said. “I’m running for president because I want to be president.”