New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is fed up with reporters’ obsession with 2016 GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump, and he scolded reporters Tuesday for asking constantly about the real estate mogul’s often-controversial antics.
The Republican governor’s remarks came during a campaign stop in Concord, N.H., as he and community leaders met to discuss efforts to help people suffering from drug addiction.
One reporter asked Christie, also a Republican presidential candidate, to respond to Trump’s latest headline-grabbing tirade.
The thoroughly unimpressed governor responded by saying, “whatever Donald Trump has said for the day today, is quite frankly nothing that I have any interest in responding to, I’m running for president.”
“We’re sitting here talking about some really important issues of recovery and addiction that is ravaging families across the country and you all, quite frankly, should be ashamed of yourselves,” he added.
Christie, who made headlines this year after a video of him addressing a town hall audience on the topic of drug addiction went viral, told reporters that he is sick and tired of hearing about nothing but Trump and his many controversial remarks.
“All you do is ask about Donald Trump every place I go,” he said. “Then I have the press complain to me, ‘Why do you think Donald Trump is doing so well?’ Well, hell, man, if you’re talking about him 24 hours a day anybody can do well.”
Trump and Christie are currently engaged in a war of words over the casino tycoon’s claim that he saw “thousands” of Muslim Americans celebrating in New Jersey after the attacks on the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. Christie maintains that no such thing ever happened.
“It didn’t happen and the fact is, people can say anything, but the facts are the facts, and that didn’t happen in New Jersey that day and hasn’t happened since,” Christie told reporters Monday at an earlier campaign stop in Portsmouth, N.H.
The Republican front-runner responded in kind, telling a gaggle of reporters Monday that the governor, “really needs to be careful about what he says.”
Since at least September, mentions of Trump on cable and network television have easily overshadowed all references to the New Jersey governor, according to data compiled by TV Eyes.
(h/t RCP)
