Late Tuesday, Christie said he’s heading home to New Jersey to “take a deep breath” and take stock of his struggling presidential bid. Monmouth University’s final New Hampshire poll had Trump leading with 30 percent, followed by Kasich with 14 percent and Rubio and Bush each with 13 percent. In fact, it’s the nation’s first primary and the next in a series of clues into what Americans want in their next president. So there are more tests to come for the candidates and the parties.
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Ted Cruz, the Texas senator who won in Iowa, is in the mix in New Hampshire with Iowa third-place finisher Marco Rubio and a trio of governors seeking to stop Rubio’s rise after his uneven debate performance over the weekend.
Snow collects on buttons for sale outside a campaign event for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump at the Londonderry Lions Club Monday, Feb. 8, 2016, in Londonderry, N.H.
Not so long ago, Republicans saw New Hampshire as the proving ground that would winnow their chockablock field of candidates. What is more, during one example, Christie interjected: “There it is!”
In an alternate debate reality, Sen. But he also took aim at his fellow governors as they battle for numerous same voters in an effort to remain relevant beyond Tuesday. “He’s a fighter, so he’s just going to get back in it and keep going. Is that going to bring people to say, I’m going to vote for Chris Christie, or did he open up the opportunity for the other governors?” So I mean, he should have told people.
Christie added a jab at Bush. “I’ve listened to your stories, and I’ve had your hugs, and I’ve seen your tears, and I’ve seen you walk away and say, I now have hope”. And they get brighter and hotter the closer you get to the presidency.
Trump responded Monday by calling Bush sad.
Cruz and Rubio, meanwhile, aren’t focusing exclusively on New Hampshire, a strategy that paid off for both in Iowa and could pay dividends in South Carolina’s February 20 primary.
Rubio was clearly rattled by Christie’s debate onslaught Saturday, repeating his standard critique of President Barack Obama several times and playing into Christie’s argument that Rubio is a scripted, inexperienced politician from a do-nothing Senate.
“You know, there’s not so much of a ground game”, he told CNN after Saturday night’s debate.
“Leadership. You learn this, you learn it by doing it”, he declared “It’s not something that you just go up, and on the job do it”.
He veered from his typical stump speech for town hall meetings, but Bush stayed largely on message, hitting the same points about taking responsibility, having experience and uniting the country.
“It’s what I believe”, Rubio said on ABC’s “This Week”.
Trump, who was to campaign later Sunday, continued to insist in a CNN appearance that he came in first in Iowa, losing only because representatives of the Cruz campaign spread false rumors that Ben Carson was dropping out.
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Trump recycled his claims about the stacked crowd at the Saint Anselm College debate, saying that it “shows how broken the system is” and that the Trump campaign was given twenty tickets. “I think there could be four or five tickets out of New Hampshire, because the race is so unsettled”. “And so we went in, I listened to the end of the secretary’s interview, went up, shook her hand”, he said. For Democrats, Sanders drew another large crowd Sunday in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where he reprised his indictment of a “rigged economy” and “corrupt campaign finance system”.
