Mitch Perry
In the aftermath of his disappointing fifth place finish on Tuesday night in New Hampshire, the Marco Rubio campaign has realized it must confront the growing concerns about his candidacy.
Although much has been made about how rattled he became during Saturday night’s debate after a verbal takedown by Chris Christie, questions about his qualifications to be president also grew to a new level in New Hampshire.
After Rubio-surrogate Rick Santorum stumbled on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” when asked to identify Rubio’s accomplishments in his political career, campaigns for both Christie and Jeb Bush employed the clip in devastating ads that ran during the weekend in the Granite State.
Apparently, Team Rubio realizes that vulnerability because a new post has appeared on the campaign’s website: “Marco Had a Long Record of Accomplishment in the Florida House.”
The section refers to how as House Speaker in 2006-2007 Rubio “balanced the budget without raising taxes,” and passed budgets with less spending than then-Gov. Charlie Crist or the Florida Senate wanted.
It lists his 100 percent ratings from the Florida Chamber of Commerce and the National Federation of Independent Business, as well as a quote from anti-tax activist Grover Norquist saying Rubio was “the most pro-taxpayer legislative leader in the country.”
When he was House Speaker, Rubio published a book called “100 Innovative Ideas For Florida’s Future.” The site lists how he was able to implement some of those ideas during his tenure, including those on eminent domain, higher education, K-12 education, crime, small government and government transparency, and executive power.
During his Senate campaign in 2009, Rubio said 57 of the 100 ideas had become law. PoliFact Florida called that comment “Half True,” claiming that only 24 of them had became law.
The Rubio campaigning is also urging supporters to re-tweet this statement, “Many people know about @marcorubio’s leadership in the U.S. Senate, but do you know about his Fla. House work.”
