Chris Christie spent much of this election cycle campaigning for Republican gubernatorial candidates, but he says Tuesday’s successes aren’t about him.
“The candidates deserve the credit. It’s always about the candidates,” the New Jersey governor, who also chairs the Republican Governors Association, told TODAY’s Matt Lauer on Wednesday about the wave of Republican gubernatorial victories Tuesday night.
“It’s not about me. I was happy to help. I’m glad to have their confidence, but that’s all it is,” he said after being asked if the success of the candidates affects his visibility across the nation ahead of a potential 2016 presidential bid.
When asked about a White House run in 2016, he said, “I’ll have to figure that out,” citing a discussion over “the next few months” that he will have with his wife.
“Mary Pat and I have to start to talk about it in earnest and make a decision, but today is a day to celebrate what my fellow governors have done and I’m glad to just have played a small part in it for them,” he said.
“There’s no hope in that,” he told Lauer when asked if he will have to control or hide his well-known confrontational temperament, one that garners both love and dislike.
“I’m not going to change, Matt. This is who I am,” he said.
For now, he is focused on the newly elected Republican governors — such as the ones in Illinois, Maryland, Connecticut and Maryland, among others.
Christie also said he hopes the Republican majority in Congress will immediately focus on working with the Obama administration to aide in growing jobs, specifically by tackling tax reform and creating a new national energy policy.
