Jim VandeHei, CEO of the all-politics news site Politico, said New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a likely 2016 presidential candidate, is politically dead.
Asked by MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough on Thursday if it was fair to say Christie is a man who is “dead but who doesn’t know it yet,” VandeHei said yes.
“I don’t think that’s the case,” said Scarborough, “but you talk to people in the Republican Party and they say Chris Christie is already politically dead. … Is that fair?”
“I think it is,” said VandeHei. “At best he’s a live man stumbling. If you look at the finances of his state, if you look at his poll numbers and if you look at those donors who used to be so attracted to him, I think they find [former Florida Gov.] Jeb Bush more attractive.”
Bush has said he is considering a run for president.
In New Jersey, much of the popularity the Republican governor once enjoyed has faded. A Quinnipiac University poll released Thursday showed that 52 percent of the state’s voters do not view Christie favorably and 56 percent say he should not run for president. If Christie did run, however, he currently leads the list of his potential GOP primary competition, according to the poll.
A separate ABC News poll, also released Thursday, found that if the general election were held today with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on the Democratic ticket, she would beat Christie by 13 points among registered voters nationally.
Also during Christie’s tenure as governor, New Jersey’s credit rating has been reduced eight separate times.
VandeHei’s assessment of Christie comes two weeks after his site reported that Christie “bulldozed” the media at a public event, though after one local TV news channel reviewed video of the incident, it decided not to air the footage, determining it wasn’t as consequential as Politico’s report suggested.
