Former Gov. Chris Christie, a close confidante of President Donald Trump, said the president needs to stop with the "inflammation without information" and provide concrete examples of voter fraud in the vote counting process.

Trump, who has complained for weeks about mail-in ballots, escalated his baseless allegations late Thursday, saying at the White House that the ballot-counting process is unfair and corrupt. Trump did not back up his claims with any details or evidence, and state and federal officials of both parties have not reported any instances of widespread voter fraud.

A number of Republicans after the speech said they were troubled by Trump's comments and called on him to back them up. Among them were Christie, a former U.S. attorney for New Jersey, who was the first well known Republican to publicly back his run for president in 2016.

"If this stuff is going on that the president's talking about, all of us want it ferreted out because it would undermine everything in our system," Christie said during ABC News' coverage of the election. "But as a prosecutor, that's like asking me to indict someone without showing me any evidence. If you're going to say those things from the podium at the White House, it's his right to do it, it's his right to pursue legal action. But show us the evidence."

Christie wasn't the only Republican from New Jersey to call out Trump.

Assembly Minority Leader Jon Bramnick, who political observers consider a potential contender for the governor's office, said Friday morning on Twitter that he was "deeply concerned about the President Trump’s allegation that the election is being 'stolen' without evidence of fraud or illegality. This attack directly from the White House is dangerous to our democracy."

Bramnick's tweet faced instant pushback.

Former Evesham mayor Randy Brown called Bramnick "tone deaf to the Republicans in New Jersey."

Another Republican Party establishment figure, RNC member and former Christie administration lawyer Bill Palatucci, said he was "saddened by the President's comments about the election."

"As an RNC member, I'll fight for my party's candidates anywhere there is evidence of wrongdoing against them. But we cannot undermine our sacred democracy with charges that votes made by mail are somehow 'illegal,'" he said on Twitter.

Trump started making claims about election fraud hours after the polls closed early Wednesday morning in a speech to supporters at the White House. Christie at the time said it was not the time to make the allegations and said that there comes a point where the process has to be allowed to play out before judging it to be flawed.

The Trump campaign has been filing legal challenges across the country as Democrat Joe Biden counties to rack up votes in key swing states. On Friday morning, Biden had overtaken Trump in Pennsylvania and Georgia, which, if he holds onto that edge, would be enough to make him president-elect.

(Includes material copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

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