Chris Christie will seek to be alternative to Trump in expected presidential campaign

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is expected to enter the 2024 presidential race, according to a source close to Christie.

Christie will announce at a town hall event at St. Anselm College in Manchester, N.H., on Tuesday. New Hampshire prides itself on its "first in the nation" status for presidential primaries and remains the first primary election in the Republican calendar. Iowa is the first voting contest for Republicans when it holds it caucuses in early 2024.

Christie has spent a notable amount of time in New Hampshire leading up to his event.

Christie first ran for president in 2016, arguing he was a candidate who would "tell it like it is." But that message was drowned out by eventual Republican nominee Donald Trump. Christie dropped out of the 2016 race after a disappointing sixth-place showing in New Hampshire.

This time around, Christie is expected to position himself as a traditional conservative alternative to former President Trump. Christie and Trump were once longtime friends, and Christie endorsed him in the 2016 primary after ending his own campaign. But Christie broke with the former president in the aftermath of the January 6th attack on the Capitol, blaming his lies about a "stolen election" for the violence that occurred. In 2021, he wrote a book titled "Republican Rescue: Saving the Party From Truth Deniers, Conspiracy Theorists, and the Dangerous Policies of Joe Biden," and his criticisms of Trump have become more forceful since the former president announced a second run.

During his time as governor, Christie gained national attention, and had flirted with a presidential run in 2012. He again found himself on the national stage when Superstorm Sandy hit New Jersey, just days before the 2012 election. His decision to welcome then-President Obama while surveying storm damage, as Obama vied for a second term, angered many Republicans. But putting aside partisan politics to address the storm secured him his highest approval ever in the state, nearing 80 percent New Jersey voters.

The following year Christie was embroiled in a controversy dubbed "Bridgegate," in which several of his staffers engineered lane closures on the George Washington Bridge as political retribution against a local mayor. Multiple people involved in the scandal faced criminal charges. Although Christie himself was never charged, the saga decimated his reputation, and he left office as the state's least popular governor ever.

NPR Senior Political Editor and Correspondent Domenico Montanaro contributed to this story.

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