Rubio gains momentum as Texas presidential primary vote approaches
Fourth in a series of reports on the chief presidential contenders in Texas’ March 1 primary.
Even before his better-than-expected third-place showing in last week’s Iowa caucuses, Texas supporters of Sen. Marco Rubio were already seeing signs of “Marco-mentum” in the Lone Star State.
He had surpassed Ben Carson’s weakening candidacy to begin running a consistent — though distant — third place in the polls behind Ted Cruz and Donald Trump and boasted an impressive endorsement from former Sen. Phil Gramm, who was a force in Texas politics for more than two decades.
Now, as Rubio seeks to convert momentum from Iowa into gains in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary and other early contests this month, his energized Texas campaign team has been scrambling to further broaden Rubio’s Texas base in advance of the state’s mega-primary on March 1.
“I’m going to be hammering the phones,” proclaimed state Rep. Jason Isaac, R-Dripping Springs, one of Rubio’s Texas co-chairmen, who said he wasted no time after the Iowa results poured in to begin reaching out to influential political leaders across the state in an effort to enlist them in Team Rubio.
Nonetheless, even boosters like Isaac admit that Rubio’s candidacy faces daunting challenges in Texas, where Cruz, the state’s junior senator, dominates the political landscape as the favorite son in the upcoming Texas primary. And while Rubio may have gotten a boost of political energy from Iowa, Cruz scored big by winning the first-in-the-nation caucuses, becoming the man to beat in the 2016 GOP presidential race, at least as of last week.
How the momentum ebbs and flows over the next month, of course, will be determined by what happens in the next contests — New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada. The biggest milestone comes on March 1 in so-called Super Tuesday contests in Texas and nearly a dozen other states. The largely Southern block of contests has been dubbed the SEC primaries because five states including Texas have collegiate athletic teams in the Southeast Conference.
Texas’ 155 delegates constitute by far the largest batch of delegates in play on Super Tuesday and therefore make the state the biggest target for candidates still in the race. NBC and Telemundo will host a Feb. 26 Republican debate at the University of Houston, four days before the primary.
A total of 108 delegates will come from the state’s 36 congressional districts, with three chosen from each district, and the remainder will be allocated statewide based on the primary results. The outcome will depend on how many candidates are in the race at the time but, barring the unforeseen, Cruz is heavily favored to win the delegate race, although other contenders also hope to snare a share of proportionally awarded delegates as well.
Field shrinking
Of the 13 presidential candidates who filed to run in Texas, four have dropped out — Lindsey Graham, Mike Huckabee, Rand Paul and Rick Santorum — and the others have shown varying degrees of interest in competing in the Lone Star State. Trump has mounted an aggressive challenge to Cruz, and at one time was tied with him.
One of the best organized in Texas is former Gov. Jeb Bush, who has drawn increasingly visible support from his prominent political family. Others, including Carson, Austin-born executive Carly Fiorina and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, all have at least a modest base of support in Texas and have given no indication of an imminent withdrawal from the race. A spokeswoman for Fiorina said last week said that the former Hewlett Packard CEO “100 percent” plans to compete in Texas.
The minimum Texas goal for Rubio, analysts say, is to pick up a substantial number of delegates and continue to expand his credentials as a candidate who can appeal to both grassroots conservatives and the Republican establishment. The overarching objective is to convince voters that he is the only alternative to Cruz or Trump who can win the general election race against a Democrat.
Fort Worth attorney Dee Kelly Jr., who contributed $2,700 to Rubio’s campaign, said “electability” was a big factor in landing his support for the Florida senator. “I think he’s a very electable candidate and I think that makes a big difference,” Kelly said. Rubio, he said, also offers a positive and optimistic message that appeals to voters.
While Rubio isn’t expected to win Texas, said Matthew Eshbaugh-Soha, chairman of the political science department at the University of North Texas, he will hope to at least “chip into” Cruz’s lead, possibly through strategically placed TV ads.
Another Super Tuesday goal, analysts say, would be to drive any remaining middle- and lower-tier candidates from the race to definitively make the Republican nomination fight a three-way contest among Cruz, Trump and Rubio. Mark Jones, a political science professor at Rice University, said Rubio would score a major coup if he dealt a death blow to Bush’s candidacy in a state where the brother and son of two presidents from Texas might be hoping to cement a comeback to his struggling campaign.
Rubio poised to rise
One of the most recent polls in Texas showed Rubio as the only candidate in double digits other than Cruz and Trump. Cruz had 30.2 percent in the latest KTVT-CBS 11/Dixie Strategies poll, released on Jan. 28, compared with 25.2 percent for Trump and 11.99 percent for Rubio. In a poll in October, Rubio polled 6.57 percent and was in fifth place behind Carson and Bush.
The latest poll showed Bush with 8.19 percent, Carson with 5.29 percent, Christie with 3.30 percent, Fiorina with 2.30 percent and Ohio Gov. John Kasich with 2.60 percent.
“Marco Rubio is perfectly situated to advance in Texas,” said Brian Graham, managing partner of Dixie Strategies, based in St. Augustine, Fla. “He’s trending in the right direction.”
Rubio conducted his first campaign rally in Texas early last month, appearing before nearly 900 at the West Dallas Park Central Hotel before attending a Dallas fundraiser at the home of Tom Hicks, former owner of the Texas Rangers. He has raised $1.9 million in Texas, the fourth-highest total among Republicans after Cruz ($13.9 million), Bush ($3.4 million) and Carson ($2.6 million).
Marco Rubio at a glance
Age: 44.
Born: Marco Antonio Rubio in Miami.
He is one of four children born to Cuban immigrants; his parents became naturalized U.S. citizens in 1975.
Grew up: He spent part of his childhood in Las Vegas but returned to Florida with his family in the 1980s, where he played football at South Miami High School.
Education: Earned football scholarship to Tarkio College in Missouri but left after a year and returned to Florida again, earning a bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Florida in 1993 and his law degree from the University of Miami School of Law in 1996.
Family: Wife, Jeannette; two sons; and two daughters.
Religion: Roman Catholic.
Professional bio:
He entered politics young, winning election as a city commissioner in West Miami in 1998 and then to the Florida House in 2000, where he ultimately became speaker. He left the Legislature in 2008 and started his own law firm before winning election to the U.S. Senate in 2010.
This story was originally published February 6, 2016 at 12:47 PM with the headline "Rubio gains momentum as Texas presidential primary vote approaches."