President Donald Trump's biggest weakness as a candidate is that he "swings after every pitch," former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who campaigned against Trump for the 2016 GOP nomination, said Tuesday while commenting on the growing Ukraine controversy.
"I said this to the president any number of times: ‘You don’t have to swing at every pitch,'" Christie told CNBC's "Squawk Box." "He swings after every pitch — the one at your head, the one in the dirt, the one 4 feet outside. It just doesn’t make sense in my mind to do that."
Christie made his comments on Trump's campaign-style while being asked about the timing of the president's call to the president of Ukraine, coming about a week after he'd instructed acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney to block just under $300 million in military aid from going to Ukraine.
The call also came one day after then-special counsel Robert Mueller testified to Congress about his investigation into Russian interference. Trump has admitted withdrawing the aid but said he took the action because of corruption in the Ukrainian government.
Further, Congress is "ineffectual" at reining in Trump, said Christie, even with more Democrats calling for the president's impeachment after reports that his conversation with the Ukranian president involved pressuring him into an investigation of Democratic presidential frontrunner and former Vice President Joe Biden's son, Hunter.
Meanwhile, Christie said he thinks the effort to take on China on trade is a "worthy fight."
“Trump has been in a whole bunch of different spots in politics over 30 years,” Christie said. “But this is the one place he has been [constant], whether it was with Japan in the ’80s or with Mexico than in the ’90s and now with China in the 2000s. I don’t think he can afford to back off now. He’s got to ride this out.”
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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