Chris Sununu says the 2024 GOP presidential candidates must be 'willing to swing' and 'take the punch' if they want a real shot at dethroning Trump in the primaries

• Sununu said Trump's frontrunner status won't shift if GOP candidates aren't willing to go after him.
• The NH GOP governor pointed to a poll that showed Trump with 37% of the primary vote in the state.

Gov. Chris Sununu on Saturday said that the crop of GOP presidential candidates going up against former President Donald Trump can defeat the ex-commander-in-chief if they're willing to go after him.

The New Hampshire Republican — who flirted with a 2024 presidential bid before opting out and who last week announced that he would not seek reelection to a fifth term in office — said on Fox News that the presidential candidates had to be willing to "swing" and "take the punch" if they actually want to dethrone Trump from his national frontrunner status.

During the conversation, Sununu brought up a recent University of New Hampshire survey, which showed Trump in the lead at 37%, which is well below a majority. The rest of the GOP primary voters were split among the other candidates.

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida was in second place with 23%, while Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina came in third with 8%, followed by Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota and former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey each earning 6% support, and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina each registering 5% support.

"That's 60% of the voters right now that are not with Trump in New Hampshire," Sununu remarked while on-air. "I think that number will grow even more and more."

"Either you're willing to swing, you're willing to give the punch and take the punch and show leadership, or you're kowtowing," Sununu said, adding that it is unlikely that a GOP candidate will flip a committed Trump backer anyway. "I don't understand the politics of it, because you're not going to get a Trump voter. Right? They're with Trump."

"So if the base is with Trump, the base is for Trump. He's still going to be in the race," the governor continued. "So you got to find your own path. And I think Chris [Christie] was right. You gotta go through them. You can't go around."

Christie, a onetime Trump ally who in 2020 helped the then-president prepare for his debates against now-President Joe Biden, has been one of the fiercest critics of the former president — going after him on everything from his current indictments to his conduct on Jan. 6, 2021. In recent days, Christie has castigated Trump as a "con artist" who is "grifting" campaign donations from his supporters to pay legal fees.

And former Gov. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas, who once served as a US attorney and congressman, has called on Trump to step aside from the race over the ex-president's current legal issues and the potential for additional indictments.

But the other candidates have largely steered clear of harshly criticizing the former president, usually directing their message to one that calls for a next generation of leadership for the GOP.

Sununu said that the Republican candidates would risk "nothing" by calling out Trump more directly.

"I don't know the political strategy here. They risk upsetting a voter that they're not going to get in the first place, right?" he asked.