Chris Christie, who served as the Republican governor of New Jersey before, is reportedly skeptical that an indictment would help former President Donald Trump’s chances in the 2024 race.
On Sunday, Jonathan Karl, a co-anchor of ABC News’s “This Week,” questioned Christie about what he believes Trump is trying to accomplish by announcing that he expects to be arrested on Tuesday and calling on supporters to protest.
Karl wanted to know what Christie thought Trump was trying to accomplish by taking these actions.
Christie, who served as governor of New Jersey from 2010 to 2018, also had previous experience working for the federal government as a prosecutor.
Christie was formerly a candidate for president in 2016, but he eventually withdrew his candidacy and supported Donald Trump instead.
Over the course of the past several years, Christie’s has become significantly more vocal in his criticism of former President Trump.
In addition, it is also widely suspected that he is now considering a presidential bid of his own in 2024.
The possibility of Trump being charged is also being discussed by other candidates who are either running or considering running for office.
Other 2024 candidates weighed in as well after Trump made the provocative claims about his alleged impending arrest:
Vivek Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur and potential candidate for the candidacy of the Republican Party for president in 2024, described the situation as a “national calamity.”
In addition former Vice President Mike Pence stated that he believes that President Trump is the target of a politically motivated prosecution in remarks to ABC News.
In a post to social media on Saturday, President Trump said that he expects to be arrested on Tuesday in connection with the investigation into hush money payments to former porn star Stormy Daniels during the 2016 election cycle that is being conducted by the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
This statement comes amid reports that law enforcement is preparing for an imminent indictment.
Daniels claims that she had an affair with Trump, which the former president has categorically denied ever happened.
Trump also asserts that the investigation being conducted by Bragg is politically motivated and denies any wrongdoing.
Christie cast doubt on both Trump’s claims that the affair never happened as well as the idea floated by some influential observers, such as Twitter CEO Elon Musk, that an indictment would help Trump politically.
Christie suggested that most Americans likely won’t change their view on Trump based on the Stormy Daniels situation, but reasoned that unprecedented images of a political figure being arrested could drastically change the national mood.
“I don’t think there’s many Americans who don’t believe that Donald Trump had an affair with Stormy Daniels and that don’t believe that he paid her money at the end of the campaign to keep it quiet. So I don’t think that the American people probably see this as a huge crime,” Christie stated.
“But the vision of a former president of the United States being processed, fingerprinted, mug-shotted … being indicted, I don’t think it ever helps anybody,” he concluded.
[READ MORE: Trump Says He’s Going to Be Arrested]
