Former Gov. Chris Christie is blaming President Donald Trump for the Republican Party’s bruising losses in New Jersey last year, arguing that the president’s standing in the state turned the GOP’s 2025 elections into “an absolute disaster.”
In an interview Sunday on 770 WABC’s “Cats Roundtable,” Christie said Trump’s unpopularity in the Garden State weighed heavily on Republican nominee Jack Ciattarelli.
“We lost the governorship by 14 points. We lost five seats in the New Jersey General Assembly,” Christie said, noting that the party is now at its lowest representation in the Legislature since Watergate. “It is a desperate time in New Jersey. We forgot how to win.”
Christie, once a close Trump ally before a highly public falling-out, said Ciattarelli’s embrace of the president alienated a critical bloc of voters in a state where Democrats hold a sizable registration advantage.
“The problem for Jack Ciattarelli was when he tied himself so close to the president, a lot of independents in New Jersey were turned off by that,” Christie said. “For the first time in a long time, the Republican candidate for governor actually lost independents to the Democrats. If that happens, you have no chance of winning.”
New Jersey, Christie argued, is uniquely inhospitable terrain for Trump-style politics. “The fact is that the president is not nearly as popular in the state of New Jersey as he is in other parts of the country,” he said, adding that Ciattarelli made himself “100 percent MAGA” — a move that “really, really hurt him.”
The former governor said the scale of the defeat underscored the problem. “It turned out not to be just a small loss, but a huge one,” he said.
Christie also warned that Republican setbacks could have policy consequences. With Democrats firmly in control of state government, he said he would not be surprised if lawmakers raised taxes again, pointing to New Jersey’s already high corporate, property and income tax rates.
Still, Christie sought to draw a contrast between New Jersey Democrats and their counterparts across the Hudson River, arguing that the state’s political climate remains less ideologically rigid than New York’s.
Sherrill, he said, is not a “hard-left Democratic socialist” like New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. “New Jersey is a very tough place,” Christie said, “but I bet you it will be better than New York.”
Christie served as governor from 2010 to 2017, making him the only Republican elected statewide in New Jersey in the 21st century. He ran unsuccessfully for president in 2016 and again in 2024, both times losing out to Trump.
His relationship with the president deteriorated sharply in recent years, with Trump repeatedly taunting Christie over the “Bridgegate” scandal that marred his governorship. While two Christie associates were initially convicted for their roles in the lane-closure scheme at the George Washington Bridge — convictions later overturned by the Supreme Court — Christie has long denied any involvement.
It’s actually Christie that destroyed Republican chances in NJ by being such a bad Republican governor no one wanted one again
You know what’s sad. The former governor knows deep down that what he’s saying is a bunch of garbage and deep down he knows the truth that Trump is extremely popular all over but Christie is still so hurt that Trump soured on him and distanced himself from him and being the hot head that he is, he can’t seem to move on as such he spends his days and nights criticizing Trump just to try to do some revenge and the really sad part is that at some of these forums he actually gets paid for spewing his hate on Trump and the Dems can’t seem to get enough of it. If the Dems would only know how irrelevant Christie is these days, they wouldn’t waste their time and money on this big (in the real sense) loser…
WRONG. New Jersey is a progressive DEM state- the only ppl that are true MAGATS ( IE CULT IDIOTS) are the blue collar areas in South/ central Jersey- that’s a minority, thank God.
Most of America HATES TRUMP, esp after this 2nd presidency-
I’m hoping for a major DEM win in the midterms so we can impeach & convict the criminal conman before he completely destroys the entire country.
The Trump regime is all about cruelty & corruption. NJ is too smart- Christie has nothing to do with it.
No it was Christy that ruined Republican chances in NJ.
Chris Christie raised the gas tax. This is a tax that every single person rich or poor or middle class has to pay all the time. No governor democrat or republican before him ever messed with it. He accomplished absolutely nothing during his tenure other than yelling at a few teachers or whoever else was in his path. Many people who would vote republican have fled the state. That is the reason why the Republican candidate lost by such a large margin.