FactChecking Chris Christie’s Presidential Announcement
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie kicked off his campaign for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination with a June 6 town hall in Manchester, New Hampshire. We fact-checked his remarks, which included false or misleading claims about former President Donald Trump, the current Republican front-runner, whom Christie attacked several times.
- Christie was wrong that Trump promised during the 2016 campaign that he would build a border wall “across the entire Mexico border.” On the campaign trail, Trump only ever promised to build a 1,000-mile wall along the nearly 2,000-mile border.
- He blamed Trump for rampant illegal immigration, in part, he said, because Trump “never changed one immigration law.” Trump may not have signed any major immigration bills, but he did institute an unprecedented number of executive policies that transformed the immigration system and made it harder for people to cross the border illegally.
- Christie left the false impression that United States residents were the first to get access to Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine because of the U.S. free-market system. The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was first made available to residents in the U.S., Canada and the European Union at about the same time in December 2020.
- Christie repeated the misleading claim that Barack Obama only provided “blankets” and “human rights aid” after Russia invaded regions of Ukraine in 2014. Obama’s administration also provided Ukraine with nonlethal military aid, including training, vehicles and radar equipment.
- He claimed that President Joe Biden initially said that “a small incursion” by Russia into Ukraine in 2022 “probably wouldn’t be a problem.” Biden said “Russia will be held accountable” for an invasion, but the U.S. response would depend on what Russia did.
- Christie also said that Trump didn’t hold any unscripted town halls in New Hampshire during the 2016 campaign cycle. But Trump’s campaign hosted a few events
