Washington Wednesday: Playing the Trump card

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s Tuesday the 21st of June, 2023.

You’re listening to WORLD Radio and we’re glad to have you along today. Good morning, I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. First up on The World and Everything in It: Washington Wednesday.

Today, two of the most recent Republican entrants in the 2024 presidential race: North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. Let’s begin with Burgum because he’s a name you’re probably not as familiar with.

So, here is a short bio: Burgum is 66, he’s a father of three, and he was successful in business before getting into politics. Burgum built a software company and sold it to Microsoft in 2001 for more than a billion dollars. He then served as a senior vice president with Microsoft until 2007.

Earlier this month, he pointed to his experience in tech as he announced his campaign for president.

DOUG BURGUM: Technology is changing every job, every company in every industry. And this change will become more rapid than ever before and we need new leadership for the changing economy.

The two-term governor was first elected in 2016, and again in 2020.

And as governor, built a conservative track record on both fiscal and social issues.

Now, Chris Christie: 60 years old, father of four, and once considered one of the GOP’s brightest stars. Early on, he was a highly popular governor, even as he made budget cuts once believed to be political suicide in a liberal state like New Jersey.

And he rose to national prominence with viral video moments from town hall events in which, shall we say, he shed the traditional political decorum:

CHRIS CHRISTIE: Well listen, let's start with this: I stood here and very respectfully listened to you. If what you want to do is put on a show and giggle every time I talk, then I have no interest in answering your question.

But all that momentum came to a screeching halt in 2013 with the so-called “Bridgegate” controversy. Before that, he agitated many Republican voters when he embraced President Obama, literally just before the 2012 election.

His 2016 campaign for president never gained much traction, but he still played an important role.

Think back to February of 2016, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s campaign was picking up steam. And it appeared that those who wanted someone other than Donald Trump might have been starting to coalesce behind Rubio.

But then came this: Christie humiliated Rubio on a presidential debate stage in New Hampshire. Listen to this:

CHRISTIE: That’s what Washington DC does, the memorized 25-second second speech that is exactly what his advisors gave him.

RUBIO: Those are the facts. Here’s the bottom line, this notion that Barack Obama doesn’t know what he’s doing is just not true.

CHRISTIE: There it is. There it is, the memorized 25-second speech. There it is everybody!

Rubio’s momentum collapsed after that, and Christie was credited with taking him down.

Now, Christie says if Republicans will put him back on the debate stage, he’ll do the same sort of thing and take down Donald Trump. But will his tactics work on an experienced street fighter like Trump?

REICHARD: Not a bad question! Joining us to talk about that and more is Matt Klink. He is a political strategist and president of Klink Campaigns. Matt, good morning!

MATT KLINK: Hey, good morning, Mary. How are you?

REICHARD: Matt, as you know, Christie soured on Trump after the former president’s response to the 2020 election results and has been a vocal critic ever since that time.
The former governor says he’s the only Republican in the field willing and able to really take the fight to Donald Trump. His pitch to voters and donors is put me on that debate stage, and I’ll put Trump in his place. Matt, is that an effective sales pitch and do you think it will earn him a place on the debate stage?

KLINK: It absolutely should earn Chris Christie a place on that debate stage. Look, Chris Christie is is a fighter. He does like to mix it up. He's very quick. He knows where the the pressure points are in most political arguments, and he is definitely in tune with what the broader public is thinking. He's a very sophisticated politician, so he could damage Donald Trump. And again, because he is so outspoken, and he actually relishes the opportunity to fight. He's the type of candidate that Donald Trump would not want to be on a debate stage with.

REICHARD: We’ve talked before about how a large field benefits Trump and hurts Gov. Ron DeSantis, who really needs for this to be a two-person primary race. So on the one hand, Christie is one more candidate to divide the non-Trump vote. But on the other hand, maybe he succeeds in taking Trump down a peg or two. So do you think Christie’s presence in this race is good news or bad news for DeSantis?

KLINK: Christy's presence right now is good news for Ron DeSantis. But the "for right now" is the optimal part of that sentence. Ron DeSantis needs to get out and do the same thing that Chris Christie is doing to Donald Trump, take him on directly and fight for this nomination. And the challenge here is that if you if any candidate frankly, even if Ron DeSantis, doesn't have the voter support for this, then he or she needs to drop out quickly. We can have multiple candidates in the race, provided that they get in and if they don't get traction that they get out.

REICHARD: Well, one would assume that Christie’s goal is not just to take down Trump, but to become president. Can you see a path for him, if support for Trump drops below, say 40%, could Christie overtake DeSantis to become “the guy” for non-Trump GOP voters?

KLINK: The path for Chris Christie to actually get the nomination is littered with with potholes. Obviously. he's kind of gone more mainstream media or liberal media. He appears regularly on ABC seven. He is quite the controversial figure himself. I think Chris Christie's role here is more to ensure that Donald Trump is not the nominee than that Chris Christie is the nominee. He will never say that because that would be a credential that would disqualify him immediately. But the odds of him winning are incredibly long, him being Chris Christie.

REICHARD: Let me ask you about Gov. Doug Burgum. What is his lane within the party and who is the voter that Burgum may appeal to?

KLINK: I can pretty much guarantee you that Doug Burgum will crush it in North Dakota. You know, frankly, I don't know why. Governor Burgum decided to get in. I mean, look, North Dakota is a is a small well run Republican state. Typically that is not a pathway for successful governors. I mean, obviously the response to that would be well look what Bill Clinton did in Arkansas. I mean, I think North Dakota is considerably smaller than Arkansas. Again, one hopes that he gets in, he gives his message a go, if it takes off more power to him would love to have a strong conservative Republican in the race. But if his message doesn't get traction, and he continues to pull, you know, 1% to 4%, he should, you know, you know, fail quickly and go back to being a great governor in North Dakota.

REICHARD: Well, before we let you go, let me ask you about the current frontrunner in this race, which of course is Donald Trump. Most Republicans, including many of his opponents, believe the recent federal indictment is political and unjust. Do you think this helps Trump long-term, or might voters eventually grow weary of the drama?

KLINK: The challenge for Donald Trump is he needs I mean, Donald Trump needs to not be thinking about the Republican primary. He's thinking general election. And if he needs independent voters and suburban women voters, this is not going to help him. And look, I think that a lot of Republicans, myself included, believe that there is definitely a two-tiered justice system, that if you're a Republican, you get it, you get it much harder from the entrenched bureaucracies in Washington D.C. than you do if you're a Democrat. But this problem with Donald Trump and the classified documents, that is a problem of the President's own making. Don't forget, Trump has 37 charges against him, he has to go 37 and 0. Think about that. He has to win all 37 of the charges, or he goes to jail for a minimum of 10 years. So this is really serious, I think a lot of Republicans, they're upset right now and support is flowing toward the former president. But when push comes to shove, and the realpolitik of who can most credibly defend the Republican mantle against arguably a an incumbent president that is less than there intellectually and mentally, the answer is, it's probably not going to be Donald Trump, it's going to be someone else. And it's just going to take a while for that to play out.

REICHARD: Yeah. What is it a concrete example of what you mean by the two tiered justice system?

KLINK: Well, I mean, just look at what happened to Donald Trump that, you know, from the very moment of his declared candidacy, the investigations were started on him, investigations that we now know, proved to be a complete hoax. The whole Hillary Clinton and the Steele Dossier, the you know, the impeachment trials. Hunter Biden's laptop, the 50 intelligence professionals putting an ad in the newspaper, for the only reason we now know through emails that have been recovered, because Joe Biden needed a talking point during the debate to refute what Donald Trump was going to say. I mean, this is the federal, parts of the federal government, FBI, CIA and others, actively colluding with the Democratic Party to keep Donald Trump from being president.

But again, the charges against Donald Trump in this case, not the New York City case with Alvin Bragg, this one they need to take seriously but it reinforces the narrative of the two tiered system of justice.

REICHARD: One last question: DeSantis so far has focused on attacking President Biden’s policies. It seems that he’s only jabbing Trump as a counter-punch when Trump attacks him. It appears he doesn’t want to alienate Trump’s supporters. Is it a good strategy for him to leave the dirty work, if you will, to super PACs and other candidates, or do you think he should be drawing sharper contrasts with Trump?

KLINK: It's still very early in the 2024 election cycle. The first debate on stage won't even be until August, with the first caucus in Iowa in early 2024. So there certainly is more time. But as every month passes, and Trump's lead remains at, you know, 20 plus points, at some point DeSantis is going to, I mean look DeSantis can run a great general election campaign, but only if he's in the general election. He's going to have to go after Donald Trump eventually. And that if he wants to be, you know, step on that stage person to person with Donald Trump, he's going to have to get tough and not counterpunch. He's going to have to be aggressive and go after former President Trump.

REICHARD: Matt Klink with Klink Campaigns has been our guest. Matt, thanks so much!

KLINK: Thanks for having me.

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