Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie exploded at entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy on Wednesday night after Ramaswamy criticized former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley’s “foreign policy wisdom.”
The exchange happened during the fourth Republican Party presidential primary debate in Alabama hosted by NewsNation.
Ramaswamy criticized Haley on foreign policy when it came to the war between Russia and Ukraine.
“One thing that Joe Biden and Nikki Haley have in common is that neither of them could even state for you three provinces in eastern Ukraine that they want to send our troops to actually fight for,” Ramaswamy said.
Ramaswamy looked at Haley standing silently amid his criticisms and said: “Look at that. This is what I want people to understand. These people have, I mean, she has no idea what the hell the names of those provinces are, but she wants to send our sons and daughters and our troops and our military equipment to go fight it.”
“So reject this myth that they’ve been selling you that somebody had a cup of coffee stint at the U.N. and then makes 8 million bucks after, has real foreign policy experience,” Ramaswamy continued. “It takes an outsider to see this through — look at the blank expression. She doesn’t know the names of the provinces that she wants to actually fight for.”
Christie harshly criticized Ramaswamy’s remarks and his own plan for how to deal with Russia in Ukraine.
When Ramaswamy pushed back, Christie fired: “You do this at every debate!”
“You say — no, don’t interrupt me! I didn’t interrupt you!” Christie yelled. “You do this at every debate. You go out on the stump and you say something, all of us see it on video, we confront you on the debate stage, you say you didn’t say it, and then you back away.”
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“This is the fourth debate that you would be voted in the first 20 minutes as the most obnoxious blowhard in America,” Christie said. “So shut up for a little while!”
Here was Chris Christie telling Vivek Ramaswamy #GOPDebate that he's "the most obnoxious blowhard in America" to "shut up for a little while" and pic.twitter.com/Guna56y7Oa
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 7, 2023
Ramaswamy responded by laughing and saying, “So, first of all, I think we just learned something from Chris Christie.”
“First of all, Chris Christie also doesn’t know what provinces in eastern Ukraine he actually wants us to fight for,” Ramaswamy said. “Chris, your version of foreign policy experience was closing a bridge from New Jersey to New York. So do everybody a favor, just walk yourself off that stage, enjoy a nice meal, and get the hell out of this race.”
Vivek Ramaswamy said to Chris Christie what everyone watching the debate is thinking. pic.twitter.com/C6C3AcRbIw
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) December 7, 2023
Christie later said that Ramaswamy had a “smart a** mouth.”
Chris Christie notes he was the U.S. Attorney in NJ after 9/11, so he knew "the threat of terrorism and bullying in this country and around the world" while Vivek Ramaswamy was "sitting with his smartass mouth at Harvard and, back then, he was a Democrat." #GOPDebate pic.twitter.com/9TVOWy7y5R
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 7, 2023