5 things you should know about Chris Christie

Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who announced a second campaign for president on Tuesday after a disappointing run in 2016, has had a rollercoaster of a political career in more ways than one.

In the space of four years, he went from a recruit of the president to a scandal-challenged sixth-place finisher in New Hampshire. Over the next seven years, he went from being one of Donald J. Trump’s most influential advisers to advertising himself as the only candidate brave enough to denounce Mr. Trump to his face.

Here are five things you should know about Mr. Christie.

He had a meteoric rise in his first term as governor…

Mr. Christie first drew national attention in 2009 when he was elected governor of New Jersey over Democratic incumbent Jon Corzine.

He quickly racked up legislative victories for Republicans in a Democratic-leaning state, including a major overhaul of New Jersey’s public employee pension system.

Using a tactic now commonplace but more conspicuous at the time, he also attacked critics at public events – in 2012 he told a law student who had harassed him that if “you act like that in a courtroom, your backside gets thrown in jail, idiot His showmanship and combativeness made him attractive to both Republican voters and party operatives, who in 2012 began urging him to run for president.

He didn’t, instead he chose to provide the keynote address for Mitt Romney at the Republican National Convention, becoming president of the Republican Governors Association and establishing himself as an early front-runner for 2016.

His profile rose further after his management of the state’s recovery from Hurricane Sandy in 2012, when he famously welcomed President Barack Obama to New Jersey – an image that infuriated some Republicans but helped tarnish Mr. Christie’s reputation. bolstering as someone who could switch modes from attack dog to a bipartisan statesman when needed.

…and a ‘Bridgegate’-powered crash in his second term.

If Mr. Christie’s first term as governor was politically victorious, his second term was politically disastrous because of a scandal that came to be known as Bridgegate.

In September 2013, not long before Mr. Christie was up for re-election as governor, senior officials of the New York and New Jersey Port Authority, which operates bridges and tunnels between the two states, closed two of three lanes into the George Washington Bridge from Fort Lee, NJ The closures caused chaos.

The apparent rationale was to study traffic patterns. But it soon emerged that a Christie ally at the Port Authority had ordered the closures as part of a plan to punish the Fort Lee mayor for not approving the governor’s re-election campaign — and that he had done so after the deputy chief from Mr. Christie of the staff emailed him, “Time for some Fort Lee traffic jams.” In a 2016 trial against the Deputy Chief of Staff and a Port Authority official, a witness testified that Mr Christie himself had been informed of the political rationale for the closures as they were taking place, and had laughed.

Mr. Christie denied involvement in the scandal, but it cost his second term in office and proved a serious liability in his first presidential campaign. By the time he left office, he had the lowest approval rating registered for every governor of New Jersey.

His 2016 campaign served to knock Marco Rubio out.

Mr. Christie first ran for president in 2016, a year in which quite a few Republicans were seen to mincemeat as rising stars in the party, and he was no exception.

He never gained much traction — against any of his competitors, let alone Mr. Trump — and came sixth in the New Hampshire primary after focusing his efforts there. The next day he passed out.

But Mr. Christie did have significant influence over the trajectory of the Republican race, just not to his own advantage.

He helped pave the way for Mr. Trump’s nomination by injuring the man who appeared to be his strongest opponent: Florida Senator Marco Rubio.

During a debate in New Hampshire in early February, Mr. Christie mercilessly went after Mr. Rubio, accusing him of being inauthentic and relying on canned lines, a criticism that Mr. Rubio believed by responding with canned lines. (“There it is, everyone,” Mr. Christie replied.) The attack was so effective that the debate audience began berating Mr. Rubio.

He was a member of Trump’s inner circle for many years…

After ending his own campaign, Mr. Christie was quick to endorse Mr. Trump, praising him for “rewriting the playbook of American politics.” His approval was a big deal, given that most of the Republican establishment was still trying to find someone other than Mr. Trump to unite.

Mr. Christie became a highly influential adviser to the Trump campaign. In typical combative fashion, he defended Mr. Trump, even when he went too far for other Republicans.

Implicit in the alliance was that Mr. Christie would get a high-ranking job in the Trump administration, perhaps even the vice presidency. But while Mr. Trump chose him to lead his presidential transition team and offered him cabinet posts, Mr. Christie didn’t get the job he really wanted: attorney general.

Still, he remained faithful and helped Mr. Trump prepare for the 2020 debate. He didn’t break away until Mr. Trump tried to undo his election loss — at which point Mr. Christie started to speak forcefully, including in a book.

…but reinvented itself as Trump Enemy No. 1.

Mr. Christie is pitching himself as the only candidate willing to confront Mr. Trump head-on. (While Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has begun doing so, other candidates have largely failed to do so, lest they alienate the pro-Trump Republican base.)

At a pre-campaign stop in New Hampshire in March, Mr Christie tried to convince voters he was the man to do this by recalling his long-ago brawl with Mr Rubio: “You better have someone on that podium who can do to him what I did to Marco,” he said.

Voters are still not convinced. In a recent poll from Monmouth UniversityMr. Christie was the only (prospective) candidate with a net negative approval rating among Republicans — only 21 percent of whom viewed him favorably, compared to 47 percent who viewed him unfavorably.

Mr. Christie said in New Hampshire in April, “I don’t think anyone is going to beat Donald Trump by standing next to him, playing footsie with him, and pretending to look almost like him.”

But the fact that he supported Mr. Trump throughout his presidency went unmentioned until a teenager asked a question: Did he still think Mr. Trump would have been a better choice than Mrs. Clinton, given his charges against Mr. Trump for undermining of democracy?

“I would still have voted for Trump,” Mr. Christie acknowledged.