In New Hampshire, he’s been joined by his mother, former First Lady Barbara Bush, who is working to convince voters that her son is “decent and honest”.
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Bush is incredibly popular out on the trail, voters often coming up to the former Florida governor to tell him how much they love the family.
“It’s very important for Gov. Bush to do well in New Hampshire and to be in the top tier of candidates and I expect that to happen”, said Negron, who is Florida’s incoming Senate president.
With the crowd warmed up, Mr Bush confidently said it was nice to be “among friends” and then laid out a comprehensive agenda of what America would look like under another Bush.
“Just wonderful to be here”, she said with her gentle but ever authoritative voice. Asked if Rubio’s position is too extreme, Bush said he “respects” it but thinks it won’t resonate with large swaths of voters. Anyone looking for someone with “a proven record of fixing problems, running to the fire … who has the record of not cutting and running but solving problems, you are looking at him”. “I’ll try to get him to call you, but it may be hard”, his spokeswoman, Gretchen Andersen, said Wednesday.
At his town hall events, Bush carefully answers every question, often in detail, describing himself a proud “policy wonk”.
“I can’t remember”, Barbara Bush said, adding that she is “not getting in a spitting match with (him because) he can spit further than I can”. Yet, in recent days, his more urgent target has been Marco Rubio, the US Senator from his own state. “And, you know, it’s probably just a name – I’m not going to support the Bushes – I don’t think I’m going support the Bushes anymore”.
Trump took to Twitter Saturday to chide the Bush clan for dragging out Barbara Bush, who is 90, to support her 62-year-old son’s flagging campaign. But he has crept past both Ted Cruz and his most immediate opposition – fellow Establishmentarians Jeb Bush, John Kasich, and Chris Christie – to take second place in the last four published polls from the Granite State.
Mostly, Bush is focused on highlighting what he considers Rubio’s lack of leadership skills.
According to sources on two different campaigns, individual candidates received fewer tickets than at any other debate, just 20. “Is it the loudest voice that insults people, that talks about carpet bombing?” asked Bush, invoking Cruz’s plan to destroy the terror group. “And I’m here to see whether I can determine whether he’d be a good executive”, said Roberta Hitchcock, Hanover resident.
“It was a big sacrifice”, Bush said.
But while the audience was quick to heap applause on Barbara, several Republicans in the crowd seemed wary of a fourth Bush term.
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Marco Rubio is heading into the latest Republican debate ready for an onslaught of attacks about his experience from a trio of rivals whose performance in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary will be critical to their White House hopes.
