Mitch Perry
His presidential campaign may be going nowhere in New Hampshire and Iowa, but Marco Rubio can boast of something that none of the other 16 GOP contenders can say today. He’s been named one of the 50 most beautiful people in Washington, according to The Hill.
Editors at the D.C.-based news site say they opened up the list this year to anyone working in politics, and had a record-breaking number of nominations.
It’s the second time the Florida senator has made The Hill’s Most Beautiful list. He also nabbed the honor during his first year in Washington in 2011.
The news comes as the 44-year-old West Miami resident tries to make some noise in the presidential sweepstakes. His popularity peaked in the immediate aftermath of his successful campaign announcement that he was a candidate for president at the Freedom Tower in Miami back in mid-April. Ten days after that announcement, he led the GOP field with 15 percent support nationally.
But since that high water mark, Rubio has sunk back to the middle of the pack of candidates in the race for the GOP nomination for president. According to an NBC News/Marist poll released Sunday, Rubio is in seventh place in both Iowa and New Hampshire, the states that will vote first in next year’s primary contests beginning in February.
Rubio’s best shot might in South Carolina, which comes after those two states. The New York Times reported Wednesday that Rubio’s campaign team and super PAC supporting him are “heavy on South Carolina talent.” His campaign manager, Terry Sullivan, ran Mitt Romney’s 2008 operation in the state and also worked as the campaign manager for Jim DeMint, a former senator from South Carolina who now leads the Heritage Foundation. And his super PAC, Conservative Solutions PAC, is based in Columbia, and is run by J. Warren Tompkins, a veteran of state politics.
