New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who has launched blistering attacks against President Obama on the campaign trail, can’t help but admire his political skills.
“Those who underestimate Barack Obama underestimate him at their own peril. He’s as good a politician as I’ve ever seen,” Christie said in a wide-ranging interview with Oprah Winfrey.
“I think he’s very charismatic, and I think he’s genuine. I think what he says he believes. That’s a very dangerous politician,” added Christie, who backs fellow Republican Mitt Romney for president.
But Christie said Obama is a better politician than a president. He faulted Obama for failing to break the gridlock in Washington.
“The only person who can call a truce when Congress is at war with itself is the president,” the governor said during the interview, which will be airing on Winfrey’s OWN cable show tomorrow at 9p.m.
Christie said he’s been able to accomplish a lot with a Democratic-run state Legislature.
“I work with Democrats, and we fight like crazy in public, but then we get in a room together and say, ‘There is a boulevard between getting everything I want and compromising my principles,’ ” he said.
Christie, who decided not to run for president this year, said he would be “much more ready” in four years if a Republican doesn’t win the White House in 2012.
Meanwhile, Christie, who talked candidly about his weight problem, said he fell in love with his wife, Mary Pat, over doughnuts.
“Let’s go break into the kitchen in the dining hall at college because we smell they are baking doughnuts for the next morning,” he recalled his future wife saying while they were dating at the University of Delaware. “So let’s sneak in and steal some of the doughnuts now.”