A tough-talking New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie launched his 2016 campaign for president Tuesday with a promise to tell voters the truth even if it makes them cringe.
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“I think it’s a hallmark of his leadership,” Mary Pat Christie told CNN’s Gloria Borger in her first solo interview ahead of Christie’s presidential announcement. With locals in this remote town of 8,000, he shot the breeze, rolled out elements of his campaign platform and shared emotional, personal stories.
While his friends and most loyal supporters cheered his declaration for president inside the gym at Livingston High School, foes of Gov. Chris Christie assembled on a field, behind a temporary fence about 200 yards away from the building, and called for his resignation.
Like his mother, Grone said, Christie is not afraid to listen to what the community has to say and to “tell it like it is”, which is the phrase that has quickly been adopted as the motto for Christie’s campaign.
In an October 2012 interview with Fox News, Christie said he didn’t “give a damn about presidential politics” in the wake of the storm.
He praised his home state during his speech, sharing how working as governor inspired him to run for president.
New Jersey residents disapprove of Christie’s job performance by 56 to 38 percent, “his lowest approval rating ever”, Quinnipiac University Poll’s Maurice Carroll said.
“As a candidate for president, I want to promise you a few things”, Christie continued.
Carole Neveux of Concord, who attended Christie’s town hall in Sandown on Tuesday and is likely to vote for the New Jersey governor, said she would never lump Christie and Trump together.
“He’ll do to the country what he’s done to New Jersey – mess it up”, said Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club. Christie was once thought to be a leading White House contender, but his star has faded over the previous year.
“He can show he’s got a record to run on in New Jersey, and he’s willing to get things done on a bipartisan way”, Kersten said. In the years since, he won reelection easily, but also struggled to revive New Jersey’s moribund economy and fought with the state’s Democratic-controlled legislature over pensions and the state budget. For Christie, it’s also the best possible spin on a negative image that has taken a serious toll on his national profile. “Christie’s administration could have achieved so much more”, the magazine wrote.
Christie now joins a long line of Republican presidential hopefuls set to face-off in 2016, including ex- Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, ex- Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Texas Senator Ted Cruz. But primary voters will not be so forgiving.
Hours earlier, Christie spoke by phone with donors, friends and out-of-state supporters.
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“If the elites in Washington who make backroom deals decide who the next president is going to be, then he’s definitely going to be the front-runner”, Christie said during a question and answer session earlier this year at the Conservative Political Action Conference near Washington, D.C.
