Trump critic Chris Christie drops out of Republican race

By Nathan Layne

(Reuters) – Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie ended his bid for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination after failing to gain momentum for a campaign centered on fierce criticism of the policies and character of frontrunner Donald Trump.

Christie dropped out just days before the first Republican nominating contest in Iowa. He had the support of just 2% of Republicans in a nationwide Reuters/Ipsos poll completed on Tuesday – the same level of support as former Representative Liz Cheney, who never declared herself a candidate.

Trump holds a big lead in the contest to be the party’s nominee against President Joe Biden in November’s election, according to the Reuters/Ipsos poll. The poll put him at 49%, ahead of former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley at 12% and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis at 11%.

Christie, 61, told a town hall event in New Hampshire that he no longer saw a path forward for his campaign, and repeated warnings about what would happen if Trump were to win the presidential election.

“I am going to make sure that in no way do I enable Donald Trump ever (to) be president of the United States again and that’s more important than my own personal ambition,” he said.

Christie’s base of support was greatly concentrated in New Hampshire, the northeastern U.S. state that holds the second Republican nominating contest on Jan. 23 after Iowa on Monday.

He had been under pressure from some anti-Trump groups to drop out and give Haley the best shot against Trump in New Hampshire, where voters tend to skew more moderate than in other early Republican nominating states.

Republican pollster Whit Ayres predicted almost all of Christie’s support in New Hampshire, which a RealClearPolitics poll aggregation put at around 12%, would likely gravitate to Haley.

“This leaves Trump as the odds-on favorite to win, but with Haley having a path to winning New Hampshire that is now a bit wider than it was when Chris Christie was in the race,” Ayres said.

Strategist Sarah Longwell, who holds regular focus groups with Republican voters, said she now gave Haley a slight edge against Trump in New Hampshire. But Trump’s odds of winning New Hampshire would likely go back up to around 60% should the other two main contenders – DeSantis and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy – also drop out.

In what appeared to be a hot mic moment ahead of his announcement at the town hall event, Christie seemed to cast doubt on Haley’s chances.