'A Huge Fail': Ex-NJ Gov. Christie Slams Trump's Debate Performance

NEW JERSEY — In his typical blunt fashion, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie roundly criticized former President Donald Trump's debate performance on Tuesday night.

This was the first debate between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee.

Christie, a Republican, dropped out of the 2024 presidential race in January. And though he helped Trump prepare for debates in 2016 and 2020, he has become an outspoken critic of his former ally.

The two-term governor of the Garden State lambasted Trump's message and method on Tuesday night, saying he "chased every rabbit down hole," focusing more on crowd sizes and false claims about migrants stealing and eating pets than on real issues.

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"Whoever did debate prep for Donald Trump should be fired," Christie said during post-debate coverage on host network ABC. "(He) spent more time talking about people eating pets, people at his rallies and whether he had more or less, than he did about the economy. And that is a huge fail tonight."

"I think what we’re going to see is that Kamala Harris is now being seen by a lot of voters as a potential president," Christie continued. "That’s what she needed to accomplish tonight. Trump better get to work, or he's going to lose the election."

Later in the evening, Christie said Trump was "wholly unprepared" during a roundtable with former Republican National Committee chair Reince Priebus and former Democratic National Committee chair Donna Brazile.

Christie went on to say that Trump "didn't do anything to try to reach out" to independent and undecided voters.

"(Harris) laid traps for him," Christie said of Trump in that segment. "She talked about his rallies and people leaving his rallies...so he spends 90 seconds on how he's got the biggest rallies in the history of American politics, rather than talking about how the high cost of energy and the high cost of groceries are destroying American families. I mean, he was awful tonight."