Chris Christie’s Night

By Noah Rothman

Thursday, September 28, 2023

 

Ahead of the first Republican debate, former New Jersey governor Chris Christie wasn’t exactly subtle about his intentions. He retailed his plan to use his platform to make what he reasonably expected would be the most full-throated and comprehensive case against Donald Trump’s renomination to the presidency. The performance the governor turned in on that stage failed to meet the expectations he had set for himself, but Christie’s second debate performance more than made up for it.

 

Yes, the former governor took the fight to Trump in absentia, but voters could be forgiven for wondering by the end of the debate’s first hour if criticizing Trump was all he had to offer. Christie ably demonstrated that it was not.

 

The one-time Garden State governor never missed a chance to criticize Trump for failing to show the proper “respect” for Republican voters by showing up to the debates to defend his record. He made that point at the debate’s outset, he included it in his closing statement, and he hammered the point throughout his remarks. But Christie wasn’t out on a limb. Florida governor Ron DeSantis ratified the legitimacy of the attack on Trump himself — a layup attack on the front-runner that every GOP candidate somehow passed on during the first debate. But that wasn’t all the former New Jersey governor had for GOP voters.

 

Christie laid into the Trump administration for putting an additional $7 trillion on the national credit card. He managed a rather deft evasion of his one-time support for a pathway to citizenship for illegal aliens in the aughts (a position that was by no means uncommon among Republican lawmakers at the time) by noting that, because the borders remain unsecured and the problem has metastasized for 13 years, amnesty is no longer an option. He promised to send the National Guard to the border to partner with the CBP to “stop the flow” of migration, but he stopped short of endorsing DeSantis and Nikki Haley’s plan to use military force across Mexico’s borders to disrupt cartel operations. That was brave because, even if it isn’t what GOP voters want to hear, armed intervention in Mexico isn’t a workable solution absent the consent of Mexico City, which would not happen without devoting months or even years we don’t have to diplomatic engagement.

 

On the Ukraine crisis, Christie alone connected that conflict to the threats the U.S. faces from near-peer competitors and rogue states across the globe. “They’re all connected,” he said, rejecting the premise that helping Ukraine resist the Russian onslaught sacrifices deterrence against China. “The Chinese are paying” for Russia’s war, the “Iranians are supplying weapons,” and the North Koreans are, too. Christie is right. Every anti-American regime on earth has lined up on one side of this conflict. On the other stand NATO and America’s Pacific allies, including Taiwan. This is not a dynamic that requires a lot of chin-stroking to appraise. It’s painfully obvious where America’s interests lie. If we don’t see it, our adversaries do.

 

Nor did Christie have any time for his fellow candidates who had succumbed to the “naïveté” of presuming that Vladimir Putin is a reasonable negotiating partner. The last four consecutive presidents, including Trump, have all tried to execute something resembling a Russian reset. All of them failed, but their failures were not cost-free propositions. That engagement bought Putin time — time he has used to invade his sovereign neighbors on three occasions, and Ukraine won’t be the last. “He wants to put the old band back together,” Christie said of the Soviet Union. “Only American can stop it.”

 

But the governor’s performance on that debate stage wasn’t dour. He didn’t channel the eschatological notion that America is such a spent force it will only take one more Democratic presidential term to finally break the greatest country on Earth. He brought the jokes. Sure, Trump failed to build his border wall, Christie said. Nor did he get Mexico to pay for it. Indeed, if Mexico had known they’d only have to foot the bill for 52 miles of new barriers, “they might have paid for the 52 miles,” he joked. In another jocular moment, Christie extended his respect to the field of candidates who did show up for the debate — even Vivek Ramaswamy, with whom he had several heated exchanges in the last debate. Turning then to the over-eager pharmaceutical CEO, who was thrilled by the gesture, Christie jokingly told him to put his “hand down.” That disarmed Ramaswamy, who laughed aloud at the admonition.

 

It wasn’t a bad debate for any of the candidates on that stage. Ramaswamy pivoted from the churlish pose he struck in the first debate to relatable and gracious, and he reminded Republicans why they found him impressive in the first place. Haley displayed a real depth of knowledge on policy with detail-rich responses to questions on health care and foreign affairs. Tim Scott had a standout moment describing the ways in which America had overcome much of its racial past and the faith he had in continued progress. Ron DeSantis did himself a lot of favors by reminding voters of his successes as Florida’s governor, and he showed that Trump’s dominance in the polls does not so cow him that he won’t take the fight to the front-runner.

 

But it was Christie who turned in the most compelling performance. And for Donald Trump’s Republican skeptics, that’s just terrible. No one in this field is as disliked by GOP voters as Chris Christie. That deficit is so deep it’s a hurdle Christie is unlikely to overcome. So, a muddled result favoring the candidate least likely to consolidate the Trump-skeptical vote only prolongs the winnowing process and makes Trump’s nomination more likely.