Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie accused former President Donald Trump of being “sick to his stomach” after a witness made a deal with prosecutors in the case accusing Trump of mishandling classified documents.
Mar-a-Lago IT employee Yuscil Taveras struck an agreement with special counsel Jack Smith’s office in which he said he would testify in order to avoid being prosecuted, according to multiple reports. Trump was indicted earlier this year on charges of illegally keeping classified documents after his term in the White House, among other allegations.
Asked by CNN’s Dana Bash about how Trump “might be feeling” about the move, Christie first predicted that the man “will be vilified, attacked and savaged by Donald Trump publicly.”
“And then secondly, Donald Trump will lay in his bed at night staring up at the ceiling trying to remember every conversation he ever had with this guy while he’s sick to his stomach,” Christie said.
“This is what the Republican Party is facing: drip, drip, drip on the guy who’s the frontrunner, which is why he cannot be the nominee,” he added.
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The former New Jersey governor has been the most vocal critic of Trump in the crowded Republican field. And Christie has previously taken aim at Trump’s complimentary treatment of his former top allies before they served in the Trump administration – and his criticism of them at the end of their tenures.
“If you believe what he said when they left, that means he didn’t pick the very best people and doesn’t know how to pick personnel. If you believe about what he said at the beginning, the great stuff, then this guy is the worst manager in the history of the American presidency,” Christie told CNN earlier this year.
Still, the former president has a significant lead over his Republican rivals in the 2024 race for the White House. In a Real Clear Politics average of polls on the GOP field, Trump has garnered 53.6% support, compared to:
Trump’s campaign quickly rejected Christie’s comments. Spokesperson Steven Cheung called Christie a “stone cold loser” in a statement to USA TODAY, accusing the former governor of seeking “a contributor contract whenever his joke of a campaign ends up in flames.”
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Chris Christie says Donald Trump ‘sick’ over Mar-a-Lago worker’s deal
