PHILADELPHIA — New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie tore into Sen. Rand Paul over his recent push for the expiration of the Patriot Act in a speech Friday afternoon.
During a luncheon at the Northeast Republican Leadership Conference in Philadelphia, Christie ripped into Paul’s “disgraceful” decision to pull footage from his Senate floor speeches and place them on his 2016 website to raise campaign funds.
Christie, who served as a U.S. attorney prior to being elected governor, told the crowd that Paul’s push to end the Patriot act “has made us weaker and more vulnerable.”
“We need to make sure we catch these criminals before they hit us again,” Christie said referencing his previous line of work. “We used every tool the Patriot Act gave us, and we used it while respecting people’s civil liberties.”
“What the Congress has done the past two weeks has made America weaker and more vulnerable, and it’s been done for purely political purposes by a professor,” Christie said.
“I fought terrorism. I put terrorists in jail, and what Senator Paul has done to this country has made us weaker and more vulnerable,” Christie told the crowd. “And then he had the gall to cut his speeches from the Senate floor and put them on his website and raise political money off of it. It’s disgraceful. It’s made our country a more dangerous place.”
“Do not make America weaker to advance your political career,” he warned his potential 2016 foe. “It’s wrong.”
The New Jersey governor’s comments piggybacked on those from another speech Friday morning to the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Road To Majority conference, where he slammed efforts to roll back the Patriot Act, though without calling Paul by name.
While Christie directed most of his ire at Paul, didn’t waste all of his venom on him, going on to call out former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee over his plan to leave Social Security untouched going forward.
“There are folks who will run for president who will tell you ‘you can’t do that.’ Governor Huckabee said ‘we can’t do that. It’s a sacred trust, and if we allow the government to lie from us and steal from us, what’s left,'” Christie said. “Well, I have an announcement for Governor Huckabee: the lying and stealing already happened. You’re late, it already happened.”
“Remember back in 2000 when Al Gore said it was a ‘lockbox?’ Let me tell you what’s in the lockbox: a pile of IOU’s everybody,” Christie continued. “The lying and stealing happened. The horse is already out of the barn, it’s too late to close the door. We’ve gotta get the hard work — dragging the horse back into the barn.”