On Tuesday, Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R), one of the fiercest critics of Donald Trump in the Republican presidential primary race, reacted to a Colorado Supreme Court ruling that found the former president ineligible to run for the White House in 2024.
In a shocking 4-3 decision, Colorado’s high court said Trump should be disqualified from the state’s primary presidential ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which states that those who took an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution but then “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against it or gave “aid or comfort to [its] enemies,” should be prevented from holding state or federal office.
During a town hall event in New Hampshire, Christie said the ruling was “premature” and predicted there would be “a lot of anger in this country” if people’s choice to vote for Trump was taken away. He added that a decision of this magnitude should not have been made before Trump faces trial in the 2020 election interference case.
“I don’t think a court should exclude somebody from running for president without there being a trial and evidence that’s accepted by a jury that they did participate in insurrection,” he said.
Trump faces four federal charges over his efforts to subvert the 2020 election, including conspiracy to defraud the United States and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. The case is scheduled to go on trial next March.
The former president has also been indicted in Georgia over his schemes to undo President Joe Biden’s win there.
Christie added that while his position might seem “counterintuitive” to many due to his past criticism of Trump, the Republican candidate said it should be up to the voters whether Trump gets another chance at leading the country or not.
“I do not believe Donald Trump should be prevented from being president of the United States by any court,” Christie said. “I think he should be prevented from being the president of the United States by the voters of this country.”
Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung released a statement blasting the decision as a “scheme to interfere in an election on behalf of Crooked Joe Biden,” and confirmed they would be filing an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court.
Most of Trump’s other GOP presidential rivals also voiced their disagreement with the court decision.
Nikki Haley, former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., echoed Christie, telling reporters at a campaign event in Iowa, “we don’t need to have judges making these decisions, we need voters to make these decisions.” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis suggested the court based its ruling “on spurious legal grounds” in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
Vivek Ramaswamy went a step further. In a post on X, the businessman pledged to withdraw from the Colorado GOP presidential ballot unless Trump was allowed to be on it, and called on Haley, DeSantis and Christie to do the same.
Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a Trump critic who is still in the GOP presidential race despite low poll numbers, said the ruling reflects a concern that he had raised earlier in the campaign.
“The factual finding that he supported insurrection will haunt his candidacy,” Hutchinson wrote on X.