Big donors abandon faltering Bush candidacy
An ill-judged attack on a rival and a devastating riposte have left the Republican candidate’s lacklustre campaign in deep trouble, writes Toby Harnden in Boulder, Colorado.
‘I’m not sure he actually wants to run for president or be president 100 per cent of the time. And 98 per cent isn’t sufficient in this game.’ Liz Mair, former John McCain aide
IT WAS the moment a protege took over from his mentor: Jeb Bush, former Florida governor and scion of a political dynasty, faltered as Marco Rubio, 18 years his junior, found the perfect reply to an attack on his voting record.
For many of the big Republican donors watching, the crushing moment – 22 minutes into the third Republican presidential debate of the 2016 campaign – marked the end of a Bush era. Speculation about when Bush might move into the lead in the race has been replaced by dark mutterings about when he might choose to quit.
That would open the way to the final irony of his political career: an endorsement of Rubio, the man he first knew as a junior Florida politician.
The exchange that left Rubio poised to snap up the Bush legacy began on the stage in Colorado when Bush cast aside a promise to be a ‘‘joyful warrior’’ and launched a condescending attack.
Latching onto a media critique that the youthful Florida senator was missing too many votes on Capitol Hill, Bush scolded Rubio: ‘‘What is it, like a French work week – you get, like, three days where you have to show up . . . you should be showing up to work.’’
But Rubio was ready. He turned and stared at Bush, who hesitated as if he knew almost immediately that the attack was a mistake. Pointing out that John McCain – whose campaign Bush had recently praised – had missed more votes in 2008, Rubio told Bush that he was attacking only because ‘‘someone has convinced you that attacking me is going to help you’’.
And then Rubio, 44, twisted the knife. ‘‘My campaign is going to be about the future of America, it’s not going to be about attacking anyone else on this stage,’’ he said. ‘‘I will continue to have tremendous admiration and respect for Governor Bush.’’ It was almost as if he had already consigned his senior rival to history.
At a crisis meeting in Houston, Texas, days earlier, Jeb’s father, George HW Bush, and brother, George W Bush, both former presidents, had expressed alarm at his slide to fifth in the Republican stakes.
Jeb Bush’s aides had signalled an attack against Rubio was coming and now it had blown up in their man’s face.
‘‘Most donors I’m hearing from are in a posture like this,’’ said Rick Wilson, a veteran Republican strategist in Florida, who is close to both Bush and Rubio. ‘‘They’re saying, ’I love Jeb, I love W, I loved his dad, I can’t blow him up yet, but will you help me find who I need to talk to in Marco’s world’.
‘‘They’re planning this out. They know we have to put up somebody who can beat Hillary [Clinton, the Democratic frontrunner] and they didn’t think Jeb was that guy.’’
Within 48 hours, the billionaire investor Peter Singer announced he was backing Rubio. Shortly before the debate, Bush’s aides had beseeched him for support.
One senior Republican said Jeb Bush had entered a mourning phase. ‘‘What else does Jeb have? The debate was emasculating. It’s not even a question of money. There’s just nothing for the money to say.
‘‘On the one hand, Jeb is saying we need to be pure and more noble, and on the other he hits Rubio with this you-missedschool-today attack which undercuts the meagre case he just made for himself.’’
The theories about Bush’s lugubrious demeanour are legion. Many feel his heart is not in running for president; that he decided to take a tilt at the White House out of a sense of familial duty or noblesse oblige. ‘‘I’m not sure he actually wants to run for president or be president 100 per cent of the time,’’ said Liz Mair, a former McCain aide. ‘‘And 98 per cent isn’t sufficient in this game.’’ Some believe his wife Columba’s reluctance is a factor. A few speculate that his ‘‘paleo’’ diet – he has lost about 18kg – has made him miserable.
The senior Republican said he sensed dismay from Bush that voters were not grateful for all the sacrifices he had made to traipse around Iowa and New Hampshire.
‘‘Jeb has made it clear he’s not going to the voters, they’re going to have to come to him,’’ he said. ‘‘And that’s just not the way campaigns work.
‘‘It’s like Jeb just emerged from a time capsule and the world has changed since he was last elected [in Florida in 2002]. The Republican party is angrier, everyone is connected to everything by their mobile phones. It’s as if he’s not in the same world.
‘‘He’s never quite engaged with the race. It’s a little bit like holding up a bouquet of flowers in a gunfight.’’
Wilson said Bush had ‘‘a very brief window to turn himself around’’, but in New Hampshire the day after the debate there was no sign of a rethink. Speaking for just eight minutes in front of a sign that said ‘‘Jeb can fix it’’ – designed to be a reference to the country, not his campaign – he tried limply to make a virtue of his failings.
‘‘It’s not about the big personalities on the stage,’’ he said, a veiled reference to the frontrunner, Donald Trump. ‘‘It’s not about performance. It’s about leadership.’’
Afterwards, he denied that his campaign, which recently had to slash staff and cut its budget by more than 40 per cent, was in trouble.
‘‘It’s not on life support,’’ he said. ‘‘We have the most money. We have the greatest organisation. We’re doing fine.’’
Bush advisers insist that Trump and the retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who is running second, will fade. A leaked campaign document strategy portrayed Rubio as a ‘‘risk’’ and the ‘‘Republican Obama’’ – an inexperienced politician with a silky tongue who would ultimately disappoint. The document also revealed that his campaign had made 70,380 phone calls in firstvoting Iowa and identified a paltry 1,260 supporters.
Bush now hopes to emulate McCain’s 2008 campaign, when the Arizona senator ran out of money but doggedly fought back to win New Hampshire and the nomination.
In New Hampshire, a state that favours outsiders, Jeb Bush is tied for fourth place, despite lavish spending on advertising. Many leading Republicans believe his campaign is over, and the only question is whether he drops out before Iowa holds its caucuses at the start of February or soldiers on to face near-certain humiliation at the polls.
‘‘Jeb quitting is the hardest possible thing he could do in his life,’’ said Wilson. ‘‘However, if you’re part of a dynasty, you sometimes have to sacrifice a bishop to protect your king. Jeb may have to bow out for the sake of the next generation, and wait for his sons and other Bushes to come up.’’