Chris Christie: Never Stop Never Trumping

Chris Christie pretending to be relevant is an occasion to remember that he’s arguably the single most pathetic post-2020 “Never Trumper,” which is saying something:

I don’t want to misinterpret all of the straight talk from the tough guy who’s willing to take stands and tell it like it is, so let me recapitulate the Chris Christie Experience for you:

• Donald Trump is/was his good friend and they had/have a relationship based on mutual “respect.”1
• Trump’s administration was marked by many policy successes and Christie supports all of Trump’s policies.
• It is permissible for a presidential candidate to say—multiple times, over the course of years—that he may not accept the results of an election.
• Trump’s mistake since 2020 has been focusing on the past and not looking to the future.
• The sole reason this mistake matters is that it hurts Republican electoral prospects.
• Chris Christie will not vote for Joe Biden in 2024 if Trump is the Republican nominee, yet will not say whether or not he would vote for Trump.
• And no one, including Chris Christie, could have known what kind of president Trump would be.
• So you can trust Chris Christie’s judgment and intestinal fortitude.

Points 3-5 are key because they’re also more generalizable — the “Never Trump…Unless He’s the 2024 Nominee” faction of Big Conservatism has settled on the narrative that there’s nothing wrong with a losing [Republican] candidate trying to overturn the results of an election in principle, but it’s bad to the extent that it damages Republican electoral prospects. Truly people of Great Integritude!

Anyway, if Trump wins the nomination, Christie will be back to fetching his Big Macs before you can say “George Washington Bridge.”