Chris Christie only he can topple Donald Trump in New Hampshire

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie boasted to an audience in New Hampshire this week that unlike other potential 2024 presidential candidates, he is not afraid of standing up to ex-President Donald Trump. 

Christie, speaking at St Anselm College in Goffstown on Monday, burnished his credentials for opposing Trump by referring to his exchange with Sen. Marco Rubio during a presidential debate in February 2016, when he assailed the Florida Republican as an inexperienced politician. 

When Rubio stumbled over an answer and repeated himself twice, Christie said sarcastically, “There it is — the memorized 25-second speech.”

Christie, who ended up dropping out of the 2016 race a week after the debate and endorsing Trump, told the college crowd, “You better have somebody on that stage who can do to [Trump] what I did to Marco, because that’s the only thing that’s going to defeat Donald Trump.

“And that means you have to be fearless, because he will come back and right at you.”

Christie suggested that other 2024 hopefuls — former US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, who has declared her candidacy, and expected rivals Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and ex-Vice President Mike Pence — lack the ​backbone to call Trump out. 

“Because it’s not going to end nicely, no matter what,” Christie said of a race against Trump. “His end will not be a calm and quiet conclusion.”

Despite Christie’s debate highpoint with Rubio​, the former governor came in sixth in New Hampshire’s primary with just 7% of the vote. 

Christie went on to advise Trump and served on the White House transition team until he was replaced by Pence.

The ex-New Jersey gov and Trump had a falling out over the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the US Capitol. 

Christie has been a critic of the former president since. 

He knocked Trump on Monday for telling voters in recent speeches that he would be their “retribution,” accusing the former president of leading Republicans down a “sinkhole of anger and retribution.

“Donald Trump said a couple of weeks ago, ‘I am your retribution.’ Guess what, everybody? No thanks. No dice,” Christie said. “He doesn’t want to be my retribution. That’s baloney. The only person he cares about is him.”

Audience member Saul Shriber rose to say he voted for Christie in 2016 and asked, “When are you going to take down Trump?”

Christie replied, “I have my timetable.”

Shriber, 67, told the ex-governor he was disappointed that Christie backed Trump after dropping out of the race.

Christie ​said that was a “mistake” he owned and that he and the other candidates at the time made a “strategic error” by thinking that they would have more chances to take on Trump one-on-one but that their campaigns folded too soon. 

The former governor said, “None of us knew what kind of president he really would be or not.”

Shriber shot back, “I did.”

With Post wires