A few days after returning from Israel, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie denounced isolationist foreign policy in a speech and compared former President Donald Trump labeling his political opponents ‘vermin’ to tactics used by Nazis to dehumanize their enemies.
“When Donald Trump compares his domestic political opponents to vermin — language that those of us who know history is equated with the worst of Nazi Germany — and suggests that they pose a greater threat to our nation than China or Russia or Iran or North Korea and this is hardly making news today. He is fundamentally unserious,” Christie said at the Hudson Institute, a Washington-based conservative think tank, on Wednesday.
Trump made the comment at the conclusion of his Veteran’s Day speech on Saturday, pledging to “root out” his political enemies “that live like vermin within the confines of our country, that lie and steal and cheat on elections,” repeating his false claims about the 2020 presidential election being stolen. The former president and 2024 GOP primary frontrunner said he made this pledge “especially in honor of our great veterans.”
The use of “vermin,” a term specifically used by Nazis and Adolf Hitler himself in his manifesto “Mein Kampf,” received widespread condemnation from historians and Democrats, including the Biden campaign who drew a direct line from Trump to Hitler.
Christie, who is polling in the single digits, criticized President Joe Biden for “timid and weak leadership,” blaming him for recent attacks on U.S. military bases in the Middle East since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war. But he largely focused on Trump and his other rivals for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, explaining why he thought their foreign policy views made them unfit for the presidency.
“It’s not just limited to the Biden administration. It's also the weak leadership that's been shown by Donald Trump during his presidency that's led to this aggression,” Christie said. “Let us not forget that over his four years, he constantly threatened to walk away from our alliances and our commitments around the globe, undermining our closest friends around the world, while also sending an open invitation to our enemies to be aggressive because they knew if they did, he wouldn't respond.”
Ohio biotech businessman Vivek Ramaswamy was “crazy” and “not fit for American business, let alone American leadership” because of his opposition to the U.S. role in the funding and arming of the Ukrainian military in their effort to repel Russian invaders. Vice President Mike Pence and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, who ended their campaigns in recent days, were “out.” North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, who is still running, “was never really in.”
“When [Florida Gov.] Ron DeSantis thinks it sounds tough by saying he's gonna slit the throats of bureaucrats or shoot immigrants stone cold dead at the border and use the United States Army to invade Mexico — this is fundamentally unserious. This is TV, tough guy talk, which he learned from his mentor, Donald Trump,” Christie said, attacking his main two rivals for the non-Trump vote. “When [former U.N. Ambassador] Nikki Haley believes that just saying over and over again ‘finish them’ in regards to Hamas is a foreign policy. She can't be taken seriously. We need to know the next four sentences after that.”
Christie’s own foreign policy platform centered on sharpening U.S. opposition to Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping, the latter of whom was meeting with Biden for the first time in a year on Wednesday in San Francisco.
Ramaswamy, Trump and DeSantis were underplaying the threat of Russia and China, Christie argued. He warned that allowing Russia to win the war in Ukraine would encourage Xi to invade Taiwan, the autonomous island territory that the U.S. arms but China claims as its own.
“Until recently, our party has always been the party that's understood that maintaining peace requires strength, strength from the American leadership. We understood that America was the indispensable country for peace, with alliances at the heart of that strength,” Christie said. “But we have short-sighted isolationism running rampant in the House caucus because all of them are following the siren song of Donald Trump. They can't run fast enough to kiss his rear end.”
“Trump claims that he'll resolve the conflict in Ukraine in less than 24 hours. We know what that means. He will just turn Ukraine over lock, stock and barrel to his brilliant, as he calls him, friend Vladimir Putin,” Christie added.
Christie boasted of his visits to Ukraine in August and Israel over the weekend as qualifications for the presidency, drawing a contrast with Trump who he described as a “personal coward.” The first ten minutes of his speech were dedicated to the Israel-Hamas war and describing the horrors he witnessed on his trip. Donning a bullet proof vest and accompanied by Israeli Defense Force troops on Saturday, Christie toured kibbutzes attacked by Hamas during the Oct. 7 massacre of over 1,000 people.
He recounted seeing blood stains and bullet holes in homes and being shown graphic cell phone videos of children being murdered.
The war, which now rages in Gaza with and has taken the lives of over 11,000 Palestinians, is an example of a global crisis where U.S. involvement requires better leadership than Trump can offer, Christie said.
“Remember something about Donald Trump harm's way for him is having his second shot in the rough at a golf course. You'll never see him in Jerusalem. You'll never see him in Kyiv or anyplace else,” he said. “We all believe in America first. But Donald Trump and the isolationists on Capitol Hill in our party believe in America alone. I know that America can never be first if America's alone.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told him when he visited Kyiv in August that while he was grateful for American support, he did not want and would not allow American soldiers on the ground, Christie recalled. If all it takes was percentages of the U.S. military’s budget to inflict pain on the Russian military, Christie said the trade off was worth it, beyond the morality of opposing an authoritarian state invading a neighbor.
“He joked with me that we were occupied by Russia, it wasn't so great and we don't want to be occupied by them again. But with all due respect, we don't want to be occupied by you either. Just give us the weapons we need and the Ukrainians will win this war,” Christie said. “And we've done that, but with less than 4% of one year's military budget. And with that, the Ukrainian army has degraded 50% of the Russian military capability without one drop of American blood.”
“Seems to me that's a pretty good return on investment for us and one that we should double down on,” he added.
Christie, who lost to Trump in 2016 and then advised him from outside the White House until he was outraged by the then-president’s lies about his 2020 election loss, is now leading an longshot, anti-Trump crusade in the 2024 GOP primary. He’s polling at just over 2% nationally on average — Trump is polling at nearly 60% — but he’s tied for third in New Hampshire at 9%, a key early primary state he has focused his efforts on and where he hopes to garner enough support to gain momentum in the minds of the voters. Trump is polling at 44% in the state, nearly 30 points higher than any other contender.
But Christie says he still sees a path. He doesn’t need to win over Trump’s base, which he pegged at 25% of the party, he argued.
“You want me to go fish in the 25% Pond? I'd rather fish in the 75% pond,” Christie said during a Q&A after his speech with Michael Doran, a former George W. Bush administration official. “If Joe Biden right now were at 40% in any state in this country in the Democratic primary, the media in this country would be saying he's dead, it's over. Donald Trump is at 40% in Iowa, 40% in New Hampshire, 40% in South Carolina and somehow he's a runaway victor. Give me a break.”
Elsewhere in his remarks, he said he would be the app TikTok because of its Chinese ownership and called for the firing of the presidents of Harvard, Penn and Cornell universities over pro-Palestinian protests. And he continued to insist he won’t run for Senate in New Jersey instead, where Sen. Bob Menendez is up for reelection as he faces federal indictment.