Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie announced Wednesday that he has secured more than 40,000 individual donations for his campaign, crossing a key threshold to qualify for next month’s first Republican primary debate.
“I’m happy to be able to tell people that last night we passed 40,000 unique donors in just 35 days,” Christie said on CNN. “There’s a donor in every US state, and we have over 200 donors in 36 states.”
Christie added that when he ran for the Republican presidential nomination eight years ago, he had just 5,000 donors 35 days into his campaign.
“There is very broad support for the candidacy,” added the former governor. “We’re really excited about this, and the good news for the Republican Party is that it means I’m going to be on the debate stage.”
The first Republican primary debate is scheduled for Aug. 23 in Milwaukee, and candidates are required to meet those donor requirements and garner at least 1% support in three qualifying polls. Former President Donald Trump, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy have all indicated that they have met these thresholds.
Sen. Tim Scott (RS.C.) also said this week that he had secured more than 53,000 donors.
Christie launched his bid for the Republican nomination last month and quickly decided to run as the alternative to Trump, who is at this point the Republican frontrunner in the race. During his announcement, Christie called Trump “a bitter, angry man who wants power back,” adding that a “selfish mirror pig is not a leader.”