Christie jabs Trump over election loss

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) took a shot at former President Trump over his 2020 presidential election loss during an interview with “Axios on HBO.”

Christie, who coached Trump before the presidential debates, was asked about a statement Trump issued earlier this week in which he claimed Christie had left office with a low approval rating.

“Look, I’m not going to get into a back-and-forth with Donald Trump. But what I will say is this: When I ran for reelection in 2013, I got 60 percent of the vote. When he ran for reelection, he lost to Joe Biden,” Christie answered during an excerpt of the interview aired Thursday. “I’m happy to have that comparison stand up because that’s the one that really matters.”

During recent remarks at a Republican Jewish Coalition conference in Las Vegas, Christie called on Republicans to move past the 2020 presidential election results and look toward the future instead.

“Winning campaigns are always the campaigns that look forward, not backwards,” the former New Jersey governor said.

Those comments were immediately slammed by Trump, who claimed that the former Republican governor was “absolutely massacred” for his statements during the conference.

“Chris Christie, who just made a speech at the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) in Las Vegas, was just absolutely massacred by his statements that Republicans have to move on from the past, meaning the 2020 Election Fraud,” Trump said in a statement. “Everybody remembers that Chris left New Jersey with a less than 9% approval rating — a record low, and they didn’t want to hear this from him!”

Trump and his allies have repeatedly claimed that the 2020 election was tainted by widespread voter fraud, assertions that have been refuted by state and federal elections officials. 

Axios noted that a Rutgers-Eagleton poll published in January 2018 showed Christie at a 19 percent approval rating.

In reaction to Trump’s comments that Christie was “absolutely massacred” for remarks during the conference, Christie told Axios’s Mike Allen, “I’ve made the conscious decision, Mike, that I want to spend my time combating the policies of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and trying to help Republicans win governorships and the House and the Senate in 2022.” 

“This is not an argument that I’ll walk away from,” Christie added.

Trump took a jab at Christie right back, baselessly claiming he had won the 2020 election and taunting Christie over the fact that Trump won the 2016 GOP presidential nomination.

“I did win the election against Biden, by a lot, just wasn’t given credit for it — weak Republican leadership in Mitch McConnell and others. The Country is going to hell, I may have to do it again! Had a lot of fun beating sloppy Chris Christie in the primaries — it was easy!” Trump said in a statement.

Updated at 5:13 p.m.