Rep. Jim Jordan should prepare to move on, according to fellow Republican Chris Christie.
Before Jordan lost his second straight bid to win the House speaker’s gavel, Christie, who is running for the Republican presidential nomination, told CNBC that the Ohio Republican should step down from the race if he does lose.
“My party seems childish,” Christie said on “Squawk on the Street” regarding the chaos among House Republicans.
Christie predicted that Jordan would actually fail to convert enough of the 20 House Republicans who voted against him on the first ballot on Tuesday. In this initial vote, Jordan received only 200 of the 217 votes he needed to become president.
“He has a history in the House, and there are a lot of relationships there, some good and some bad,” Christie said of Jordan.
“I think after that second vote, if he doesn’t get that, I think he has to do what Steve Scalise did, which is to say, ‘Okay, that’s not me, step aside and let’s see who’s next,’” he said.
Christie fudged the question of whether he believed Jordan should lead the Republican-majority House.
Instead, he said, the GOP’s priority should be to quickly elect a president so Congress can deal with a slew of pressing issues.
“What I would say is, just bring in a speaker. You know, we have aid to Israel, aid to Ukraine, aid to Taiwan, border security, a budget, all of this has to get done. And none of that can be done without a president.” He said.
“So let’s get someone and let’s move on.”
But Christie said he did not support the idea of electing Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-Md., as interim president as a temporary measure to enable the government to perform some essential functions.
“If he does one thing they don’t like, he’ll get out and we’ll be back in this situation again,” Christie said, referring to a cadre of far-right Republicans who led the campaign to oust the last Speaker of the House, Republican Rep. Christie. Kevin McCarthy, Republican from California.
Christie is a vocal opponent of former President Donald Trump, the front-runner in the 2024 Republican presidential primary, and who backed Jordan for speaker.
In his CNBC interview, Christie criticized Trump and some of his other primary rivals, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and right-wing businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, on foreign policy and other issues.
National polls show Christie far behind these candidates, especially Trump, who consistently leads by far in this area.
Christie said he believes the race will change in the 100 days before the first nominating contests approach, as voters in key primary states begin to pay more attention.
This article originally appeared on www.cnbc.com
