Carly Fiorina's poll surge is killing Chris Christie

Carly Fiorina, the former chief executive of Hewlett-Packard, has surged ahead in Republican primary polls, bumping Chris Christie from where he was hanging on to the 10th position in the sea of GOP runners. Huckabee, polling at 4.3 percent, replaces him in the running; Fiorina, meanwhile, charts in at 6.3 percent in Real Clear Politics' poll. Christie is down to 3.3 percent.

A new CNN/ORC poll Tuesday morning reports similar numbers:

Chalking up Fiorina's success in part to her performance at the first Republican debate, where she was an agreed-upon standout, financial columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin writes in The New York Times' Dealbook that Fiorina's popularity is also a testament to burying — or reframing — her less than stellar past:

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Chris Christie, meanwhile, scrambles to make up ground ahead of the CNN Republican primary debate on September 16, where the top 10 contenders will participate in the primetime discussion. He'll likely need more than a "really good pony" to save his chances.