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Chris Christie’s book: Trump surrounded by ‘amateurs, grifters, weaklings,’ and ‘felons’

The former New Jersey governor's blistering new book also explains why the president wears extremely long ties.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's memoir will be released Jan. 29.
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's memoir will be released Jan. 29.Read more

President Donald Trump is surrounded by “amateurs, grifters, weaklings, convicted and unconvicted felons,” and also believes long ties are slimming, according to former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s blistering new book.

In Let Me Finish: Trump, the Kushners, Bannon, New Jersey, and the Power of In-Your-Face Politics, the ousted member of Trump’s transition team lays into the president’s associates, writing that Trump had a “revolving door of deeply flawed individuals ... who were hustled into jobs they were never suited for, sometimes seemingly without so much as a background check via Google or Wikipedia,” according to excerpts published in Axios.

Remaining relatively unscathed in the latest White House kiss-and-tell is the president himself, according to the Guardian, which also obtained text in advance of the book’s Jan. 29 release.

Here are some of the memoir’s highlights made public thus far.

‘The kid’

Particularly, Christie targets Trump son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, whom he accuses of carrying out a political "hit job” on the former New Jersey governor in retaliation for Christie’s prosecution of Kushner’s father, Charles, in 2005.

During his stint as U.S. attorney in New Jersey more than a decade ago, Christie charged the senior Kushner with crimes including tax evasion and campaign finance violations — an event far from water under the bridge to “the kid," as Steve Bannon apparently refers to Kushner.

“This was a family matter, a matter to be handled by the family or by the rabbis,” Kushner told Trump, according to the excerpts.

Simmering for years, the vendetta over his father’s prosecution was behind the Trump adviser’s push for the president to sack Christie, then-White House chief strategist Steve Bannon apparently said.

“Steve Bannon … made clear to me that one person and one person only was responsible for the faceless execution that Steve was now attempting to carry out. Jared Kushner, still apparently seething over events that had occurred a decade ago,” Christie wrote.

“The kid’s been taking an ax to your head with the boss ever since I got here,” Bannon allegedly told Christie while firing him at Trump Tower.

‘Amateurs, grifters, weaklings, convicted and unconvicted felons’

Christie, who penned the memoir with what the Guardian describes as his signature "blunt, caustic and at times self-satisfied” language, also turns his wrath on former national security adviser and decorated general Michael Flynn, who is awaiting sentencing for lying to the FBI in connection with the investigation into the 2016 election.

Calling the former general “the Russian lackey and future federal felon,” Christie says Flynn was “a train wreck from beginning to end ... a slow-motion car crash," according to the Guardian.

The Guardian’s report said Christie also condemns former Attorney General Jeff Sessions for recusing himself from the probe into Russia and the 2016 election, calling Sessions “not ready for prime time.”

He adds that the president “trusts people he shouldn’t, including some of the people who are closest to him," and is surrounded by “amateurs, grifters, weaklings, convicted and unconvicted felons.”

The skinny on the tie

On a lighter note, the tell-all also provides insight into another area of the White House: the president’s wardrobe.

Apparently, Trump — who once pressured Christie to lose weight — urged him to wear longer ties to appear slimmer on the 2016 campaign trail. The strategy is one the president also appears to employ.

But the visual trickery may not be fooling everyone.

Parodied on social media and by comedians Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart, Trump’s signature below-the-belt neckwear has been scrutinized in the public eye.

If your tie isn’t falling just above your waistline and firmly tied (without being throttled), then it’s time for some serious re-evaluations on... everything,” Esquire wrote.