Marco Rubio’s uneven debate performance just days before Tuesday’s pivotal New Hampshire primary has emboldened a trio of governors seeking to stem his rise in the Republican race for president.
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Trump, who finished second to Cruz in Iowa, was pleased with his debate performance and place atop New Hampshire’s Republican polls, and again called for the U.S. to reinstitute waterboarding and even harsher treatment for interrogating foreign prisoners. “There was a march among some of the chattering class to anoint Senator Rubio”, Christie said of the attention the Florida senator received after his strong third-place finish in last week’s Iowa caucuses.
Meanwhile, support in the Granite State for outsider candidates Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson continue to fall, as the two candidates continue to poll in the single digits, along with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.
“I know I’m behind”, Clinton, who trails Sanders in New Hampshire, said on CNN’s “State of the Union”.
“I think that the anointment [of Rubio] is now over, so that changes the entire race…”
The senator from Florida has been viciously lambasted afterthe drubbing he took from N.J. Gov. Chris Christie where he continued to repeat the same talking point four times. “The drive-by shot at the beginning with incorrect and incomplete information and then the memorised 25-second speech that is exactly what his advisers gave him”, Mr Christie said, goading the surging Republican in a packed field. “There it is everybody”.
“I saw an opportunity to do the best we could” in a Senate that at the time was controlled by Democrats, he said.
Another 18 percent of likely voters said it’s somewhat or very likely they could support Christie, while 62 percent said they would not vote for him. “That’s not the way we’re going to do it when I’m president”, Rubio added, saying he’d stress border security before working on any immigration deal.
One of them was Katherine Lynch, 60, who made her decision between Rubio and Christie after the debate.
While Rubio was criticized by pundits over the exchange with the bulldogged Christie and the video was being circulated by Dems, the senator told ABC that he “would pay them to keep running that clip because that’s what I believe passionately”. “Last night alone, we just had a brief question about North Korea”.
“I think so”, Trump said when asked if he was “taking the lumps out”.
“The message that’s coming out from that is Marco Rubio is not ready and he showed it at that debate”, he said. “When I’m elected president this will become once again the single greatest nation in the history of the world”.
On the Democratic side, New Hampshire favorite Sanders and Clinton – a narrow victor last Monday in Iowa – have a long road ahead. “We’re going to win with Trump and people back down with Trump, and that’s what I like”. “That is downright wrong”, said Bush.
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A WMUR focus group after the debate revealed that voters were unimpressed.
