A road sweeper appears in the pre-dawn twilight and trundles noisily past a man fixing red, white and blue bunting to a hedge at the Casa Cuba restaurant.
I have been advised that there’s a couple of guys running for president who actually call Florida home,” the former New Jersey governor quipped to an audience of about 200 as they breakfast on plates of croquetas and assorted Cuban pastries.
As if to highlight the point, Christie delivered a perfectly reasonable stump speech in Miami, promoting the tenets of “smart conservatism”, and the perils of re-electing Joe Biden to a second term.
Notably, the audience only properly stirred when Christie began to lob disparaging personal volleys at his Republican opponents, including entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, who is emerging as an unlikely challenger.
“Christie is making a gamble that attacking Trump and DeSantis will establish his position for when or if they fall down,” said Charles Zelden, professor of history and politics at Nova Southeastern University, and a veteran Florida poll watcher.
“Christie is the only one running on the Republican side that has the courage to be outspoken against Trump, even though it may cost him a lot of votes, and I think he would come across very strong with people wanting a straight answer, and feel the guy’s honest,” he said.
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Except in his words he only became fully anti-Trump after Jan 6. Not after Trump nearly killed him by giving him Covid or all the other scandals of the administration.
Chris Christie can be a pretty good speaker, I don't even think he is stupid. He is just an oppurtunist who will become whatever he needs to become for success.