New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said on Sunday that President Donald Trump “deserves great credit” for signing an executive order temporarily barring visitors from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States, which he claimed is different from the “Muslim ban” Trump touted on the campaign trail.
“I think the President deserves great credit in moving from where he began in the campaign, which was a Muslim ban, which I at the time said I completely disagreed with,” Christie told John Dickerson on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
He said Trump “tailored” the order from his campaign promises with the help of advisors.
“I would make it even more tailored if I were advising the President on this directly,” Christie said.
He blamed the order’s “haphazard” implementation for backlash against Trump.
“Thee reason his opponents are able to attack him and I believe unfairly on the substance is because it was implemented in such a haphazard way in that first weekend. And so the President deserves better,” Christie said.
But he said his comments were not “about assigning blame.”
“This is about making sure that it’s done the right way,” Christie said. “And so in the end I believe the President deserved better, because I know his heart, and I know what the President wants more than anything else.”
“He wants to keep the American people safe and secure,” he added.
Trump’s promise of a hold on Muslim immigration to the United States stoked controversy on the campaign trail.
After the President signed the executive order, White House press secretary Sean Spicer claimed that it was not a “ban,” contradicting both Trump and himself.
And just days earlier, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani connected the order directly to the Muslim ban Trump proposed on the stump.
“When he first announced it, he said Muslim ban,” Giuliani said. “He called me up, he said ‘Put a commission together, show me the right way to do it legally.'”
Giuliani denied that the executive order had anything to do with religion, saying it was founded on a “factual basis, not a religious basis.”
This is incorrect, as the order stipulates that Christians and other members of minority religions be given priority over Muslims.
Christie broke his silence on the order on Tuesday, telling reporters he thought Trump’s advisors bungled the rollout.
“The President deserved much better than the roll-out that he got of this plan,” he said. “I think that’s what caused a lot of the mistakes that were made. And those mistakes are unacceptable.”
