But for other candidates, like Republican Govs. Christie unleashed withering attacks against Rubio in Saturday’s debate, and the New Jersey governor tripped up Rubio by calling him out in real-time for his reliance on rehearsed talking points.
Advertisement
Rubio is catching up fast after an astonishingly strong third-place finish on Monday in Iowa, behind US Senator Ted Cruz and Trump.
At the heart of the battle between Rubio and Chris Christie, John Kasich and Jeb Bush is whether the Florida senator has the experience.
CNN’s Chris Cuomo, nodding to Bush’s personal history with Rubio, asked Bush how he felt watching Chris Christie blast Rubio over his remarks during the debate. Same thing with Marco.
“The fact is, he’s never accomplished anything of any note in the United States Senate”, Christie said of Rubio. “That is exactly what his advisers gave him”, said Christie, who repeated a version of that response several times as Rubio continued. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said over the weekend that there was “a special place in hell” for women who don’t help women, while writer and famed feminist Gloria Steinem suggested women backing Sanders were doing so to meet boys.
“That’s what Washington, D.C., does – the drive-by shot at the beginning with incorrect and incomplete information and then the memorized 25-second speech”.
The usually-poised Rubio was booed for accusing the governor of dragging his feet in leaving the campaign trail when his state was hit by a deadly East Coast snowstorm last month. “Here is what it is going to be about – what is America going to be like when they are my age?”
Do you think Donald Trump will maintain his lead and win New Hampshire on Tuesday?
In New Hampshire, Trump commands 35 percent of support among likely Republican voters, a 21-point lead over closest rival Rubio, according to the latest 7News/University of Massachusetts Lowell poll. Cruz, the Texas senator won Iowa, though he’s looking beyond New Hampshire to a run of Southern primaries with more conservative electorates. The Democratic race between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders swerved in a new direction after a pair of prominent Clinton supporters railed against female voters who are backing Sanders despite the prospect of electing the first female president.
At his rally, Trump’s delivered a meandering version of his usual campaign speech.
Trump called eminent domain “a good thing”, saying, it was necessary to constructing roads, bridges, schools and hospitals. Michael Dickinson, sporting a Jeb sticker, said he appreciated hearing from a “more comfortable, more genuine and less awkward” Bush in recent days. Second-place Marco Rubio has triple the support.
“I have no friends, as far as I’m concerned”, Trump said.
Kasich, a Republican governor from the swing state of OH, who is on the lookout to tap New Hampshire’s independent voters, also made a spirited pitch.
Advertisement
“You have not been involved in a consequential decision where you had to be held accountable – you just simply haven’t”, Christie told Rubio early in the debate.
