Christie Says It’s ‘Undeniable’ Trump Gave Him COVID

NEW JERSEY — Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie took aim at former President Donald Trump, his Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and the White House physician during an interview on the Firing Line With Margaret Hoover, premiering Friday at 8:30 p.m. on PBS.

Christie said he unknowingly spent four days prepping Trump for debates with now-President Joe Biden, some of their spirited role plays resulting in “saliva flying back and forth,” between them, he said.

He and wife Mary Pat Christie learned much later, he told Hoover, that Trump had one positive COVID test on Sept. 26, 2020, followed by a negative one in that time frame, from an unusual source - Meadows’ recently released book, “The Chief’s Chief.”

Christie has been making his own rounds plugging his book “Republican Rescue,” including on Hoover’s PBS segment, parts of it posted on her Twitter account on Thursday.

"If the #Republican Party wants to be relevant going forward, if we spend 2022 and 2024 trying to relitigate the 2020 election…we're gonna lose again like we lost in 2020. We lost."

—"Republican Rescue" author @GovChristie

FRIDAY @PBS

Local listings: https://t.co/yjV9uYyL5J pic.twitter.com/rNywYJbsgA
— Firing Line with Margaret Hoover (@FiringLineShow) December 8, 2021

“I think it’s inexcusable,” Christie told Hoover, stating Meadows instead “saved it for a book.”

He described it as “undeniable” that he likely contracted COVID from Trump, his hunch that he wasn’t aware of Trump’s testing regimen, though he was in close contact with him.

Christie’s case landed him intensive care, Hoover noting during the interview that the results could have been fatal for Christie.

Although he said that as Trump’s then-friend, the relationship having since turned icy between the two, Christie said Trump could have also succumbed to it.

The two haven’t talked, Christie said, since they disagreed about Trump’s 2020 Presidential Election fraud commentary, around December 2020. Instead, they have commented about one another in public spaces, Christie most recently at a November Republican Jewish Coalition Leadership Meeting in Las Vegas, as well as in other interviews, where he said that Republicans need to move away from the election fraud dialogue.

He has also taunted Trump in these forums about having lost the election to Biden.

Trump wrote on his website that Christie was “absolutely massacred” for statements he made at the meeting in Las Vegas, claiming Christie left New Jersey with “less than a nine percent approval rating.”

Christie told Hoover that the Republican loss of the presidency was a "personal rejection of Donald Trump," with the GOP gaining momentum because of Biden, Kamala Harris and "Congressional Democrats."

"We are winning because the other guys are losing," Christie said.

"We lost in 2020 because it was a personal rejection of Donald Trump."
@GovChristie sees the GOP’s "momentum" now — but says it’s because "Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and congressional Democrats have created momentum for us."

"We are winning because the other guys are losing." pic.twitter.com/2kQTi7JmfL
— Firing Line with Margaret Hoover (@FiringLineShow) December 9, 2021

Six of the seven people exposed to Trump regularly after that positive COVID test and at the time Christie was working with him, ended up testing positive, Christie told Hoover.

“If Mark Meadows knew that someone I was sitting across from for four days had popped a positive test, he as the White House Chief of Staff, should have said something,” Christie said.

Watch the dialogue about this topic between Hoover and Christie in the video below:

MORE: @GovChristie describes saliva "flying back and forth" at debate prep after Trump reportedly tested positive for COVID — and kept it quiet.

“Look, he had an obligation to tell me. And so did Meadows and, by the way, so did the White House physician.” https://t.co/ztUMWBsbgj
— Firing Line with Margaret Hoover (@FiringLineShow) December 9, 2021

Questions or comments about this story? Have a local news tip? Contact me at: jennifer.miller@patch.com.