Tuesday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” GOP presidential candidate Gov. Chris Christie (R-NJ) took aim at two of his competitors, Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Ted Cruz (R-TX), for their stances on national security issues.
Speaking from Concord, NH, Christie told co-hosts Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough that like Barack Obama, the country can’t afford to have another inexperienced president like Barack Obama and Christie included Rubio as well as Cruz.
“As do Ted Cruz and others in this race who have no experience in governing,” Christie said, and pointed to the two senators’ votes in 2013 against authorizing force in Syria.
Scarborough countered and asked if Ted Cruz had made America less safe as well.
“Sure he has,” Christie responded. “He went for the easy political vote at a time when it looked like it kind of was a popular thing to do. With all those dead Parisians it doesn’t look so popular anymore.”
Christie was then asked to explain that response and how a governor is involved in national security.
“I was the United States attorney for seven years,” he said. “Let me tell you something, that next day after September 10, it was personal. The fight against terrorism was personal to me and we brought the two — two of the biggest terrorism cases in the post-9/11 era. I’m the only person on that stage that’s used the Patriot Act, I’m the only person on that stage that’s used the FISA court, I’m the only person on that stage who has actually fought terrorism, knows how to use those tools and knows how to bring terrorism to heel. And that’s why. Because I didn’t get briefed in some basement on Capitol Hill and have to get a vote on subcommittee in which I could vote differently in the sub-committee and then vote differently on the floor.”
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor
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