Cruz and Rubio vying for conservative vote
Texas senator focuses on far right; Fla. senator seeks wider coalition.
After a Republican presidential debate in which sober policy discussions edged out the loud personality clashes that have dominated so far, the campaign’s focus narrowed Wednesday into a battle for the party’s most conservative voters.
That fight, which could be the most decisive but unpredictable element of the nomination contest, increasingly appeared to be head- ing toward a confrontation between two first-term senators who were both elected with tea party support but who have since taken different paths: Ted Cruz of Texas and
Marco Rubio of Florida.
Each made his pitch in subtle but unmistakable ways during the debate and afterward, as they left Milwaukee for a day of campaigning across the country.
The most glaring difference between the two that surfaced during the debate was over the issue of immigration policy. Cruz tried to portray Rubio as a moderate beholden to the Republican establishment, while Rubio argued that his approach was the most reasonable and workable conservative solution.
“I think for voters that are looking for someone who’s consistent and true, I’m the only one on that stage who’s always opposed amnesty,” Cruz said in an interview on Fox News after the debate, underlining his opposition to the bipartisan immigration bill that Rubio helped write in the Senate.
After avoiding the immigration issue Tuesday night, Rubio addressed it in an interview Wednesday, telling Fox News that he understood why the immigration proposal — which has cost him support on the right — was the wrong approach.
“The lesson I learned from that is the people of the United States do not trust the federal government on immigration,” Rubio said as he listed a set of policies he said would “realistically but responsibly” address the problem.
“If you’re a criminal, you’ll be deported,” he said. “If you’re not a criminal, and have been here longer than 10 years, you have to learn English. You have to start paying taxes. You’re going to have to pay a fine. And then you’ll get a work permit.”
He did not mention the question that enrages so many conservative voters: whether to eventually grant citizenship to immigrants in the country illegally, though he acknowledged on NPR that those who earn so-called green cards would eventually be able to apply for citizenship.
The difficulty Rubio faces on immigration — trying not to alienate voters on the right while not appearing unreasonable to the voters he hopes will support him in a general election — was evident Wednesday morning in an appearance on CBS News. He was pressed on whether the United States should deport people shielded under the executive action President Barack Obama took last year. That step, which gave nearly 5 million undocumented immigrants a reprieve, is being challenged in court and could fall.
“We need to enforce our law,” Rubio said when asked whether he would favor deporting them.
Rubio flew later Wednesday to Iowa, where several hundred people came to hear him speak at a restaurant in Davenport. His state campaign chairman, Jack Whitver, told the crowd that the debates were helping Rubio steadily expand his following.
Cruz planned to attend a gathering with veterans in New Hampshire.
Both men are essentially fighting over a pool of voters that neither can lay claim to at the moment: higher-educated and more religious conservatives who are now mostly supporting Ben Carson, the retired pediatric neurosurgeon who largely failed to distinguish himself Tuesday on a stage full of candidates who were far more fluent in domestic and foreign policy.
Carson and Donald Trump lead the GOP field in the most recent national polls, with Rubio and Cruz following them.
While Cruz and Rubio have similar, reliably conservative, voting records (Cruz has a 100 percent rating from Heritage Action for America; Rubio earned 93 percent), they could not be more different in the way they have positioned themselves. Cruz sees his path to the nomination coming by solidifying the support of the far right. Rubio aims to build a broader Republican coalition while recognizing that he cannot afford to appear too moderate and risk alienating the party’s core voters.
Cruz knows his path to the nomination will be less encumbered with Rubio wounded, and he tried to do so several times in the debate without mentioning his name.
In an exchange that probably went over many viewers’ heads, Cruz criticized a subsidy program for sugar producers that Rubio supports — a position that has earned the Florida senator scorn recently from fiscal conservatives.
Rubio, who did not address the issue in the debate, was asked about it on ABC’s “Good Morning America” and said he would continue to back the subsides until other countries got rid of their similar support.
“I want us to be able to compete with other countries,” he said. “But it has to be fair. They already have huge advantages. They don’t have an EPA, they don’t have labor unions in those countries.”