CHRISTIE: I think these are state-by-state determinations.
CHRISTIE: First of all, the FBI director himself said they can't vet these folks. Secondly, we had a woman who was wearing an explosive vest in Paris who blew herself up when approached by police this week.
Q: The police actually have said that, as they have studied that crime scene further, she was not wearing a suicide vest, although her role with the terrorists is still unknown. CHRISTIE: [With vetting orphans], I don't understand the distinction, quite frankly. And what we need to do is to protect the homeland first.
CHRISTIE: I will highlight that we were wrong to cut back on the NSA's metadata collection and that its been destroying the morale of our intelligence officers. We need to rebuild that program. We need to support law enforcement, which this administration hasn't been doing. We need to do all those things first and foremost to protect the homeland, because the number one job of the president of the United States is to protect the safety and security of the American people. National security is not an option. It's a fundamental right. And that's what we will be focused on.
CHRISTIE: This is part of the problem with this administration. They're an imperial administration that just decides they're going to place people in individual states and not even inform the state of government of the fact that they have done it. And they're placing them through nongovernmental organizations and not giving any information to the state governments. We should set up a safe haven in Syria, so these folks don't have to leave their country in the first place. This is something that the president has created and now he wants the American people to absorb this crisis that he has created.
CHRISTIE: I don't think that's something we need to do. What I want to see is a nation that continues to say, we want you to practice your religion and practice it vigorously. And as long as you practice it peacefully, and you're not trying to impose your religious values on anyone else, then you should be able to practice it the way you want. I don't think we need another government agency, quite frankly. I don't think we need to add more layers of bureaucracy to this government and add more expense. And so, no, that's not something I would favor.
CHRISTIE: ISIS doesn't seem to be concerned about civilian casualties. We need to get real about this; we need to bring our allies together and revise rules of engagement to make sure that what we're doing is taking on ISIS in a significant, direct way that will be effective. So, this administration has no credibility in giving us any type of assessment of how this is going. We have the attacks in Mali now. Obama said al Qaeda was on the run. Obviously, that's wrong as well.
[plays clip] Q: would you support a shutdown?Q: Have you changed your heart on this? Should Republicans force defunding Planned Parenthood by threatening a shutdown?
A: I said that you shouldn't be throwing around threats--you should take action and that's what I have done as governor of New Jersey, to defund Planned Parenthood six years ago. You should put the defunding of Planned Parenthood on the president's desk. If he's going to veto it, let the American people see that he stands with the folds who believe that the systematic murder of children in the womb, in a way that preserves the body parts to be sold on the open market, is something that he stands for.
Christie: I think the Pope was wrong. I just believe that when you have a government that is harboring fugitives, murdering fugitives like Joanne Chesimard--who murdered a state policemen--that this president could extend diplomatic relations in that country without getting her returned so that she can serve the prison sentence, is outrageous
A: I think that there's a problem across the country with our citizens and our police force interacting with each other in a positive, constructive way. We need to engage in a different way. And you see what we have done in Camden. There we brought in an entirely new police force and we trained them in a different way in community policing.
Q: Recently Hillary Clinton said, "race still places a significant role in determining who gets ahead in America and who gets left behind"; do you agree?
A: I think there's still racism in our society. And every leader in our country should be speaking out against that and should be doing everything we can to provide opportunity for everyone.
A: The national teachers union--because they're not for education of our children. They're for greater membership, greater benefits, and greater pay for their members. And they are the single most destructive force in public education in America. I have been saying that since 2009. I have got the scars to show it. But I'm never going to stop saying it, because they never change their stripes.
A: My first alternative and preferred alternative is to arm the Jordanians, the Egyptians, the Emiratis and the Saudis to bring this fight to those folks. They need more help. They need better arms. They need more support from an intelligence perspective and they need to know that America's going to stand with them when the polls are up or down.
A: What he's doing is not going to work, to absolutely just cave in the Cubans. The fact is that we're now going to send hundreds of millions of dollars down to Cuba in tourist activity and economic activity and none of that is going to get to the people of Cuba.
A: There are not enough law enforcement officers, local, state and federal combined to forcibly deport 11 to 12 million people. This is like building a 2,000-mile wall across the border that Mexico is going to pay for. It sounds really good but the question is how? I think the way to do this is E-Verify. If folks new they weren't going to get jobs, they would not come.
Q: And what would you do with the 11 million who are here?
A: We're going to have to come up with a solution that's going to involve using E-Verify as well.
A: Let's talk the facts of the deal. We shouldn't be getting the hyperbole. The fact that we have to wait 24 days to inspect a site if the Iranians object is outrageous. That would be like me getting a search warrant, coming to somebody's house who I think is committing a crime and saying, here, I have got a search warrant, I will be back in 24 days to search.
Q: Well, if it was a radioactive crime, the inspectors say that they would be able to discern whether or not there was radioactive material there 24 days later.
A: The president promised any time anywhere. And you cannot tell me that, in 24 days, the Iranians cannot move the elements of cheating from one area to another.
Other contenders offered entirely opposite positions. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, for example, said he "absolutely" supports the RFS. "That's what the law requires. So let's make sure we comply with the law. That should be the minimum," he said, drawing applause from the crowd.
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The above quotations are from CNN "State of the Union" interviews during 2015 (Candy Crowley interviewing candidates for 2015 and 2016 races). Click here for other excerpts from CNN "State of the Union" interviews during 2015 (Candy Crowley interviewing candidates for 2015 and 2016 races). Click here for other excerpts by Chris Christie. Click here for a profile of Chris Christie.
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