Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said Wednesday that he’s ending his Republican presidential bid just days before Iowa’s leadoff caucuses in a last-ditch effort to deny Donald Trump a glidepath to the nomination. “My goal has never been to be just a voice against the hate and division and the selfishness of what our party has become under Donald Trump,” Christie said at a town hall in New Hampshire. “I’ve always said that if there came a point in time in this race where I couldn’t see a path to accomplishing that goal, that I would get out,” he said. “And it’s clear to be tonight that there isn’t a path for me to win the nomination, which is why I’m suspending my campaign tonight for president of the United States.” It wasn’t clear whether Christie would be immediately endorsing one of his rivals, but he was overheard criticizing Haley on a livestream set up by his campaign ahead of the event. “She’s going to get smoked,” he said. “She’s not up to this.” He said DeSantis called him, petrified he would endorse Haley, but the hot mic was cut before Christie finished speaking. The dropout comes as a surprise, given that Christie had staked the success of his campaign on New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary, which is less than two weeks away. He had insisted as recently as Tuesday night that he had no plans to leave the race, continuing to cast himself as the only candidate willing to directly take on the former president. “I would be happy to get out of the way for someone who is actually running against Donald Trump,” he said at a town hall in Rochester, New Hampshire, while arguing that none of his rivals had stepped up to the plate. “I’m famous enough. … I’ve got plenty of titles. … The only reason to do this is to win,” he added. “So I’d be happy to get out of the way for somebody if they actually were going against Donald Trump.” But Christie faced a stark reality: While recent polls showed him reaching the double digits in New Hampshire, Haley shows signs of momentum. A CNN/UNH poll conducted in the state this week found Trump’s lead down to the single digits, with 4 in 10 likely Republican primary voters choosing Trump and about one-third now choosing Haley. Allies of Haley, including New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu and other anti-Trump Republicans, had been urging Christie to exit, hoping a large portion of his supporters would flock to Haley, giving her a chance to turn the race into a two-candidate contest with Trump, the overwhelming favorite for the nomination. The New Hampshire poll — which showed Christie at 12% — found about two-thirds of his supporters would select Haley as their second choice. Christie had run as the race’s fiercest critic of the former president-turned-GOP front-runner. He warned voters against nominating a candidate who has been criminally indicted four times and could very well be a convicted felon by the November general election. And he argued Trump will lose in a rematch with President Joe Biden, the likely Democratic nominee. While his anti-Trump message attracted much media attention and helped bring in waves of small-dollar donations that kept him in the race — and […]