“Last night, we surpassed 40,000 unique donors in just 35 days,” Christie told Anderson Cooper on CNN, noting that she far surpassed the number of acquired donors in the same time frame in 2016. “There is a donor in every state in America, and we have over 200 donors in 36 states.”
Throughout her campaign, Christie has aimed to view the former president as a failed leader whose legal and ethical baggage made him unfit for office. But the former governor — along with every other contender in the field — still has a long way to go to knock Trump out of first place in the competition.
In the aforementioned qualifying poll, Trump garnered 56% approval. The next most voted candidates were Florida Governor Ron DeSantis with 17% and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy with 8%.
All individuals who wish to appear in the August debate must also sign a loyalty pledge to support the eventual Republican nominee. Christie suggested to CNN that they sign him, but not necessarily keep their promise.
“I will take it as seriously as Donald Trump did in 2016. We all signed the pledge in 2016,” Christie said. “At the next debate, after we all signed the pledge, one of the interlocutors said: ‘You all signed. Would you like to reaffirm by raising your hand?’ And nine of us raised our hands and Donald Trump didn’t.
Trump has not officially announced whether he will attend the August event.
A super PAC affiliated with Christie’s campaign, Tell It Like It Is, followed up Christie’s comments Wednesday night with a donation request that said he had taken the stage.
