Donald Trump critic Chris Christie drops out of Republican primary race

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Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie has ended his campaign for president, in a move that was expected to consolidate support for Nikki Haley and the remaining Republicans challenging Donald Trump for the party’s nomination for the White House.

“It’s clear to me that there isn’t a path for me to win the nomination,” Christie said at a town hall event on Wednesday in Windham, New Hampshire. “I know it’s the right thing to do,” he added, vowing that he was “going to make sure that in no way do I enable Donald Trump to ever be president of the United States again”.

Christie’s withdrawal comes just days ahead of the Iowa caucuses, the official start of the presidential primary on January 15.

While his decision should send some of his supporters to Haley, Christie’s announcement was overshadowed by a hot mic incident, when he was heard saying in a campaign livestream before taking the stage in New Hampshire that she would get “smoked” in the coming primaries and that Ron DeSantis was “petrified”.

Trump later referenced the remarks in a post on Truth Social, his social media platform, calling Christie’s comments about Haley “a very truthful statement”. DeSantis on the X social media site weighed in too: “I agree with Christie that Nikki Haley is ‘going to get smoked’,” he wrote.

Bobbie Kilberg, a Christie donor, told the Financial Times that the former governor did not intend to support another Republican candidate.

Christie tore into his opponents at the town hall on Wednesday, saying that if Trump became the party’s nominee, it was because the other Republican candidates had raised their hand on a debate stage last summer to say they would vote for Trump even if he were convicted of a crime.

“Anybody unwilling to say Trump is unfit to be president is unfit themselves to be president,” Christie…