New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is predicting victory over former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton if he ultimately jumps into the 2016 presidential race.
“If I run, I will beat her,” he told radio host Hugh Hewitt on Mr. Hewitt’s show.
The famously straight-talking Mr. Christie said that Pennsylvania, New Mexico, New Hampshire and Colorado would be “in play” and pointed to his 2013 re-election with 61 percent of the vote, including 51 percent of the Hispanic vote, 22 percent of the African-American vote and 56 percent of the female vote.
“Those are the type of numbers we’re going to have to run up across the country to be able to have the type of sweeping victory you want to have to maintain a Republican House and Senate, and have a Republican president,” Mr. Christie said. “You don’t have to theorize that with me. You’ve seen I’ve done it in what is one of the bluest states in America after governing as a conservative for four years.”
Mr. Christie is in the early presidential state of New Hampshire this week as he tries to lay the groundwork for a potential 2016 run and move beyond the “Bridgegate” scandal that has dogged him over the past several years.
In an address on Tuesday, he pitched an overhaul to Social Security policy that would raise the retirement age to 69, means test people with non-Social Security income of more than $80,000 per year, and phase out payments for people with $200,000 per year of retirement income.
Mr. Christie pledged to come forward with more policy addresses in the next two months on national security and defense, taxes and economic policy, and a national energy policy.
“I don’t think you’ve seen anybody who’s trying to engage in a national conversation even go near entitlements at all, let alone talk about it with a level of specificity as I did today,” he said. “Each one of these speeches I’m talking about giving over the next two months will have that level of specificity to its proposals. The American people need to hear from folks who at least want to be part of the national conversation specifically what they would do. And you know, broad generalities are nice, and we all like them, but that’s not the kind of decisions you make as an executive. You’ve got to make real decisions.”
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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