Chris Christie Calls NRA Ad “Reprehensible”
(6:24pm Update: I fell for the NRA’s misinformation. The school that the Obama daughters attend, Sidwell Friends, does not have a single armed guard. The Washington Post‘s Fact Checker gave the NRA’s ad their worst rating.)
New Jersey’s Gov. Chris Christie has had another clash with the party and conservative base that he may hope to lead in 2016. The outspoken Republican this week called a recent NRA ad “reprehensible” for criticizing the President Obama‘s gun control measures in light of the armed protection his daughters receive.
“To talk about the president’s children, or any public officer’s children, who have—not by their own choice, but by requirement—to have protection, and to use that somehow to try to make a political point is reprehensible,” Christie said.
“The president doesn’t have a choice, and his children don’t have a choice, of whether they’re going to be protected or not,” the governor said. “It’s awful to bring public figures’ children into the political debate. They don’t deserve to be there.”
He added that “for any of us who are public figures, you see that kind of ad, and you cringe, you cringe.”
According to the law that authorizes the Secret Service to protect the president, he cannot turn down his detail; presumably, as minors, neither can Sasha and Malia.
President Obama is critical of suggestions to put more guns and armed guards in schools in the wake of the Newtown shooting. Some conservatives have called this hypocrisy, as the Obama daughters have both Secret Service details and armed guards at their private school in DC. ((Liberals respond that comparing the security risks of the First Daughters and average Americans is absurd.)
This is far from the first time Christie has butted heads with those supposedly on his side. He drew jeers from conservatives for praising President Obama and FEMA’s response to Superstorm Sandy. That coolness led Christie to decline invitations to appear with candidate Mitt Romney in the final days of the campaign.
Many of Christie’s policies are bona fide conservative- but he seems to be losing patience with the tactics and tone of many of his allies. Is this a step away from his Republican presidential ambitions, or a step towards a new party? What do you think?
[via Yahoo News]
