Jeb Bush's onetime protégé, Marco Rubio, is starting to cramp Bush's style. That's at least one reason why Bush spent a lot of time emphasizing his own executive experience as governor of Florida during his campaign
announcement.
"There’s no passing off responsibility when you’re a governor, no blending into the legislative crowd or filing an amendment and calling that success."
Sahil Kapur gives us
a glimpse of how Bush's allies are following suit.
Right now, Bush's allies see Rubio, a Miami neighbor turned presidential rival, as the biggest threat to his nomination. Corroborating that notion: A Quinnipiac Poll out Wednesday shows the younger Florida Republican running even with or better than Bush against Hillary Clinton in three swing states.
Asked if his emphasis on his eight years as governor is meant to put Rubio on the wrong end of an invidious comparison, Bush demurs. But his backers are less coy. They are eager compare the two Floridians' campaign launch speeches: Rubio's in April offered an emotional narrative of his family's journey from Cuba, without mention of a single policy accomplishment. Bush's, on the other hand, heavily emphasized his executive experience. At lunch after their candidate's launch rally, Bush backers emphasized Rubio's lack of it.
“I like both of them, but I think Marco needs more time. Marco's very impulsive,” Harriet V. Carter, a community liaison for Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Cuban-American Republican from the Miami area, said at the lunch. Carter, like her boss, is backing Bush over his one-time political protégé. “He's still learning,” Carter said of Rubio. “He's had a few missteps along the way.”