Let's play that exchange
between Governor Christie
and Governor DeSantis
about whether Trump is fit for office.
Father Time is undefeated.
The idea
that we're going to put someone up there
that's almost 80
and there's going to be no effects
from that.
We all know that that's not true.
And so we have an opportunity
to do a next generation of leaders
and really be able
to move this country forward.
We also need a president
that can serve two terms.
I don't think Donald Trump
I think he's going to
I don't think he will be able
to get elected.
The Democrats want him to be the nominee.
We see that
they are going to turn the screws
the minute if he got the nominee.
Do you think he's going to see it to be?
I think we need to have somebody younger.
Why did he just answer the question?
The question was very direct
is he fit to be president or isn't he?
The rest of the speech is interesting,
but completely nonresponsive.
And if we were in a courtroom,
they strike the answer
and say,
Governor to Santos,
no, they would say they're smart or,
you know, they would know.
They would they would strike the answer.
They would guess you're not answering.
All right.
You have not a very good thing.
No, I don't. My thing we don't.
The thing
is, we do need to do
some talking about him
being 80 years old.
Let me when somebody is
elected, that's what Santos
is, and nobody does.
Ron, if you think we have an opportunity
to find somebody
in the public eye,
you don't have to worry about.
But from what you can get in the system,
we'll do it. I'm going to come to you.
Finish.
Look, Father Time is undefeated.
I don't know how he would score on
on a test, but I know this.
We have an opportunity
to nominate someone, intellect,
someone for two terms.
Who's going to be spitting
nails on day one and for eight years.
Do you think he's resolved?
We should not nominate somebody
who won't answer, who said
who's almost 80 years old.
He's afraid to answer.
No, I'm not.
He's. Don't you have to know?
Either you're afraid
or you're not listening.
It's not a question. You
know.
And Dana Bash standing
by with Governor Christie.
Dana,
Thanks, Anderson.
Governor,
thank you so much for being here.
Glad to be here.
As we were just watching, that moment,
I was saying to you
is almost as if you were the
fourth moderator in that debate.
Well, it's
not a role I want to play,
but I'm sick and tired of being
at these debates
and watching the other three folks
who are on the stage
not willing to answer the questions.
The voters who are watching deserve
to hear an answer
and especially on something like that.
Ron, I try to play both sides
the middle and so is Nikki.
They don't want to say he's unfit
because they don't want to offend anyone.
Well, you have no business
being the president, United States,
if you don't have the principles
to stand up for what you believe in,
even if it might offend some people
and even that might make them booyah,
which I got tonight and I don't care.
You've gotten it a lot
every time you mentioned Trump's name.
That's fine, because you are
you know what they're offended by?
You know, they're booing.
They're booing the truth.
They're booing the truth
because they're in denial.
He is going to be a convicted felon
come this spring.
And what I said in my closing
statement is absolutely true.
He will be a candidate
if he's our nominee
who won't be able to vote for himself,
why would anybody else vote for him?
You mentioned Nikki Haley.
I want to play part of you
coming to her defense
pretty aggressively in this debate.
He has insulted
Nikki Haley's basic intelligence,
not her positions, her basic intelligence
If you want to disagree on issues,
that's fine.
And Nikki and I disagree on some issues.
But I'll tell you this.
I've known her for 12 years,
which is longer than he's
even started to vote
in a Republican primary.
And while we disagree about some issues
and we disagree
about who should be president,
United States.
Well, we don't disagree on this.
This is a smart, accomplished woman
that you should stop insulting
Where did that come from?
I mean, look, I'm a truth teller.
Dana and I look, Nikki and I disagree.
I don't think Nikki should be president.
United States but I'll tell you this.
She's a smart woman
and she's an accomplished woman.
And she's worked
incredibly hard
both in South Carolina and in the U.N.
And I think
Jake does have a woman problem.
I do think he insults
women's basic intelligence.
He's done it over
and over and over again.
And I guess tonight,
I just had had enough
I had enough of listening to his garbage
and as I said,
his smart ass Harvard mouth,
because that's what it is
when he's dictating to me.
And Nikki Haley,
we've committed ourselves
to public service
while he's been off
stealing from seniors
to make his fortune.
Yeah.
I'm not going to put up with him anymore.
So you call yourself a truth teller,
but you're also a very savvy politician.
Thank you. You're welcome.
And I
think the wind up
there is about New Hampshire.
And it was very interesting to watch you
and Nikki Haley, certainly,
as you said,
you disagree about a lot of things,
but it seemed as though you were forming
a bit of an alliance with her.
Yeah. A place like.
No, no, no.
Look, I'm a truth teller, darling,
and I'm going to tell the truth.
If someone is insulting
Nikki Haley in a way that was personal.
It was nothing about issues.
He was saying she's not smart enough
to know
where things are on the map,
that somehow
his three year
old son is smarter than a woman
who served as a two term governor
and a U.N. ambassador. He's a jackass.
And if that happens, it's not me,
you know, forming an alliance
with Nikki Haley.
Wait.
You see what's going to happen
over the next seven weeks?
What's going to happen?
We're going to be competing
against each other.
Hard to try to win New Hampshire,
I suspect.
And I have a lot of promise.
Look,
I've said tonight
she's unwilling to take on Donald Trump.
She didn't do it again tonight.
She's not willing to say Sanford.
She's not willing to lower that hand
that she raised in August
to say that
even if he was a convicted felon,
she would support him.
We should have a higher standard
and she fails on that front.
But, you know, at the end of the day,
if someone's being unfair
to somebody else
who I've had a
12 year relationship with,
I'm not going to let him beat her up.
Like that.
The moderators didn't step in
and ask for any decorum.
So let me say something,
whether it was a fake or ran tonight.
They want to fight with somebody,
fight with a guy from Jersey
You know what? That's like that.
I don't know what that's like,
but I think she also.
Well,
I want to ask about
more about Donald Trump
and the fact that you said
multiple times,
as you've said,
really
since the beginning of your candidacy
here, that
they're not
going after the big person in the race.
The person who is very far and away
the frontrunner.
Let's listen to part of that.
So do I think
he was kidding
when he said he was a dictator?
All you have to do is
look at the history.
And that's why failing
to speak out against him, making excuses
for pretending that somehow he's a victim
empowers him.
You want to know why
those poll numbers are where they are?
Because folks like these
three guys on the stage
make it seem like
his conduct is acceptable.
Let me make it clear
his conduct is unacceptable.
He's unfit
That is kind of your mantra on this.
One of them,
one of the mantras on this campaign
and obviously
you had an opportunity
to do it
to your three
remaining opponents on the stage there.
Do you really think that they're going to
all of a sudden start to go
after Donald Trump?
If they want to win, they better
Because look at the strategy
they've been pursuing.
The strategy they've been pursuing
is consigned to fail.
You wonder how I know
because I did the same thing
eight years ago.
I ignored them.
So did Jeb Bush.
So did John Kasich.
And when.
And Marco Rubio.
And you know what happened? We all lost.
We all lost
because we wouldn't
call them out on the fact
that he was never going
to get Mexico to pay for a wall.
We wouldn't call him on the fact
that he wasn't
going to balance
the budget in four years.
We wouldn't
call him out on his Muslim ban garbage.
You know,
we figured he was just going to go away.
Well, hope it's not a strategy.
And that's why we're on to San Francisco
from the mid thirties to single digits.
That's why
Nikki Haley is 30 points behind
him, her own home state.
I'm telling you this.
People are going to wake up.
They're going to wake up to this message.
When they do,
there's only be one person on the stage
who is telling the truth. And it was me.
You obviously
knew what you wanted
to accomplish tonight.
Do anything on that stage.
Any comment
from any of your opponents surprised
You know,
it's the same stuff over and over again.
Ron DeSantis has memorized answers.
Nikki Haley trying to have it both ways
and for fake,
who is the drunk
driver of the debate stage.
You never know where he's going
or what he's going to hit.
So, no, nothing surprises me.
Anything that he didn't get to.
Yeah.
And I think
like, look,
I didn't get to talk about the border,
the moderators
to give me a chance
to talk about the border,
which I really would have liked to
have had an opportunity to do.
And there were two questions
right at the end,
I think, of the second segment
where they went to the other three
and never came to me.
So, you know, we got time.
I got a sense
there'll be more debates here
after the first of the year.
Hopefully in Iowa and New Hampshire.
And I also think there's been
plenty of time for me
as I'm campaigning
to make sure I continue
to emphasize those points.
But those are
the things that I didn't get to
because they just didn't
give me a chance.
If they, as you saw tonight,
that if they would have asked,
I would have answered. Yes.
I definitely know that.
Governor, thank you so much.
Dana, thanks for the time tonight.
Thanks for being here in Tuscaloosa.
Roll Tide, roll tape.
There you go.
Kaitlan Collins, that's for you.
The drunk driver on the debate stage.
I think that is great.
That's the best line of the night.
Christie, Christie for the first time
in this whole debate season, felt
it seemed like he felt comfortable.
Maybe the smaller stage
benefited him for the audience
he's trying to appeal to
in New Hampshire, his attitude tonight.
So that straight talk kind of thing
went after DeSantis
a little bit on the on the Trump stuff,
defended Haley.
He was funny there.
He helped himself tonight.
Now,
it's like
it helps over the national polls.
But the narrow thing
he's got to get done
is independents and Democrats
in New Hampshire coming out
and casting an anti-Trump vote and
again, though,
Haley and him
being in the race together
at the same time in New Hampshire
trying to take on Trump is problematic.
But I thought this might have been
Christie's best night of the four so far.