Paul will campaign at an event for Lonegan and might run into his rival, Chris Christie. Rand Paul to campaign for Lonegan

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul will visit his sometime rival Chris Christie’s home state of New Jersey next week to campaign for Republican Senate candidate Steve Lonegan, POLITICO has learned.

Paul, who sparred sharply with Christie this summer over their divergent views on federal surveillance and intelligence-gathering programs, plans to visit Clark, N.J., on Sept. 13 to campaign with Lonegan.


A source said that Christie, the popular governor midway coasting to reelection in November, has also been invited to participate. A Christie spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.

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The Senate race does not appear to be a close contest: Lonegan, the former mayor of Bogota in Bergen County, has trailed Democratic Newark Mayor Cory Booker by wide margins in recent polling for the October special election. Booker was ahead by 28 points in a Fairleigh Dickinson University survey released last week.

Paul and Christie are both viewed as top contenders for the GOP’s 2016 presidential nomination, with Paul representing its libertarian-leaning, tea party wing, and Christie hewing to a more traditional brand of Republicanism.

The New Jersey governor and his party’s Senate candidate have held each other at arm’s length during the 2012 race: Christie has endorsed the combative Lonegan but has scarcely campaigned for him, while Lonegan said in an August MSNBC appearance that his views are closer to Paul’s than Christie’s on issues such as NSA surveillance and Hurricane Sandy aid.