Chris Christie, Donald Trump.Photo: Heidi Gutman/Walt Disney Television/Getty; SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty

Chris Christie, Donald Trump

Former New Jersey Gov.Chris ChristiesaysDonald Trumpis “the cheapest S.O.B. I’ve ever met in my life,” in the wake of reports that the former president has been diverting campaign funds to a political action committee that was used in the past to pay his legal bills.

In a Tuesday interview withPolitico, 60-year-old Christie said: “What Donald Trump is good at is spending other people’s money.”

Speaking to Politico, Christie described 77-year-old Trump as “a billionaire who refused to pay his lawyers with his own personal money, and instead, men and women out there who believe in him and wanted [him] to be elected president are donating money to try to forward his candidacy … and he’s diverting that money to pay his own legal fees."

The former governor continued: “He is the richest candidate in this race, yet he is using public money to pay his legal fees. He should be ashamed of himself.”

“I am going to be very clear — I’m going out there to take out Donald Trump. But here’s why: I want to win, and I don’t want him to win,” Christie said at a two-hour town hall event at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics, where he made his official announcement thathe is running for presidentearlier this month. “There is one lane to the Republican nomination and he’s in front of it. And if you want to win, you better go right through him because let me guarantee something from knowing him for 22 years. He’s going to try to go through Ron [DeSantis] and Nikki [Haley] and Tim [Scott] and anyone else who stands in his way.”

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Christie was once a close ally of Trump but became an ardent critic of the former president near the end of his term in the White House, particularly following theJan. 6, 2021, Capitol riotand Trump’s refusal to accept defeat in the 2020 election.

More recently, Christie has worked to cast himself as the only Republican challenger capable of handling Trump’s attacks on the campaign trail — and fighting back.

In a 2021 interview with PEOPLE, Christie said that his 20-year friendship with Trump has been full of “ups and our downs, but my view is: I’m going to be here to tell the truth as I see it.”

source: people.com