TRENTON -- Former Gov. Tom Kean has some political advice for Donald Trump: Don't pick Gov. Chris Christie as your running mate if you hope to become president, and start surrounding yourself with better advisers.

"If I were to advise him politically, it's not the way to win the election," said Kean of talk about a possible Trump/Christie ticket.

Kean said the governor's geographically similar background does little to help New York native Trump in battleground states like Ohio, Virginia and Florida.

Kean stressed that Trump needs to build a first-class team. He said Christie, who's Trump's transition chief, is "just one person" and cannot provide all of the needed counsel or expertise.

"What any president needs to do is get the best people," Kean said. "He hasn't done that yet."

The former governor professed admiration for Trump's single-handed rout of a crowded GOP field, but said his tendency to speak outlandishly and disagreeably has thus far kept many top Republicans -- including himself -- from embracing the mogul and offering crucial support and advice.

Like Christie, Kean was once himself considered a possible running mate -- for George H.W. Bush in 1988, delivering the keynote address at the GOP National Convention that year.

Shortly after learning he'd deliver the keynote, Kean got a phone call from Democratic Gov. Mario M. Cuomo of New York, who'd addressed the Democratic National Convention four years earlier.

"Just say the kinds of things you are saying in the state," Cuomo told Kean.

In that 1988 convention speech, Kean articulated a theme of unity through acceptance, saying, "The simple truth is: There are no spare Americans."

He published a book later that year expanding on the theme. Entitled "The Politics of Inclusion," the phrase he often used, it urged political cooperation among historically divided groups.

That socially liberal and fiscally conservative recipe propelled Kean to re-election in 1985 with the largest margin of victory ever recorded for a gubernatorial race in New Jersey: a staggering 47 percentage point margin.

In the decades since, Kean has often criticized extremist responses to immigration in the GOP, such as when he derided Pat Buchanan's February 1992 promise to "halt the invasion" over the U.S. southern border with a fence and troops within six months of becoming president.

"Not only is it a morally wrong thing to do, it's silly," Kean told the Associated Press in August 1992 after Buchanan delivered a controversial speech during the Republican National Convention in Houston. "What are you going to have, a wall, a great wall of China?"

Today, Trump's embrace of anti-Muslim and racial rhetoric and, especially, the call for building a wall along the entire southern border while deporting millions of unauthorized immigrants has kept many, including Kean, from committing to the presumptive nominee.

"He's said some things I cannot agree with in any way," said Kean, "And I think that if he doubles down on some of this stuff, it becomes a question of judgment."

But as a professor of history, Kean said that he recognizes that "there's something totally new happening in the country, and it involves the greatest economic change in the history of the revolution."

And he credits both Trump and Christie for seeing as much early on.

Trump, for speaking to "dislocated people, who are not uneducated, but who feel that the government hasn't done anything to help them." And Christie for endorsing Trump when "nobody had done it yet."

Despite Trump's use of often divisive rhetoric, Kean said that Christie ought not be faulted for supporting Trump, nor accused of selling out.

"He couldn't endorse [U.S. Sen. Ted] Cruz; he would've been a tragedy as a nominee and a president. And there was no way Kasich could be the nominee short of a brokered convention. So, no: Who'd he sell out? [Trump] was always going to be the nominee."

In the meantime, Kean thinks Trump's chance of winning to be "small" but still possible, provided that the mogul can begin exercising restraint and demonstrating judgment needed to win over Garden State voters.

"It's unlikely the GOP nominee is going to win New Jersey," said Kean. "But if Trump can carry New Jersey, he'll be the next President of the United States."

But what about Trump winning Tom Kean, Sr.'s vote? He says it's not out of the question.

"I have some strong disagreements with Donald Trump has said, but I will hope to support my party's nominee," Kean said. "I'll be waiting and watching."

Pressed for what Trump might have to do or say, the former governor demurred.

"'Waiting and watching' means I'm not going to say anything just yet," Kean said. "He's been a surprise to everyone."



Claude Brodesser-Akner may be reached at cbrodesser@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @ClaudeBrodesser. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.