{"id":33075,"date":"2016-02-04T09:01:42","date_gmt":"2016-02-04T17:01:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/rivals-target-rubio-trump-calls-for-an-iowa-do-over\/"},"modified":"2016-02-04T09:01:42","modified_gmt":"2016-02-04T17:01:42","slug":"rivals-target-rubio-trump-calls-for-an-iowa-do-over","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/rivals-target-rubio-trump-calls-for-an-iowa-do-over\/","title":{"rendered":"Rivals target Rubio; Trump calls for an Iowa do-over"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOW, N.H. <\/strong>\u2014 While Donald Trump called for a do-over, Marco Rubio tried to capitalize on his moment in the spotlight Wednesday as the shrinking field of Republican presidential hopefuls jockeyed for position in a race rattled by an Iowa surprise.<\/p>\n

Trump took to Twitter to vent his frustration with the Iowa results that landed him in second and gave fresh hope to Republicans hoping for a Trump-less race. Among those is Rubio, who seized on his third-place finish to cast himself as the sole \u201cunifier\u201d in a deeply fractured party and the man best positioned to beat a Democrat in November.<\/p>\n

Rand Paul announced he was dropping out, and put a new crop of voters up for grabs for the other contenders. The Kentucky senator had tried to improve the GOP\u2019s popularity among younger voters and minorities. But his appeal never broadened much beyond the small group of libertarian-leaning Republicans who backed the previous White House bids of his father, Rep. Ron Paul.<\/p>\n

Trump was still smarting over Iowa. Gone was the humble candidate who conceded to Ted Cruz on camera Monday night. In his place was a take-no-prisoners Twitter rant.<\/p>\n

\u201cBased on the fraud committed by Senator Ted Cruz during the Iowa Caucus, either a new election should take place or Cruz results nullified,\u201d Trump tweeted, following up on earlier Tweet claiming, \u201cTed Cruz didn\u2019t win Iowa, he stole it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump has accused Cruz backers of spreading rumors that fellow candidate Ben Carson was dropping out of the race \u2014 even as caucusing was still underway.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany people voted for Cruz over Carson because of this Cruz fraud,\u201d Trump wrote.<\/p>\n

Before Trump\u2019s tweets on Wednesday, Cruz spokesman Rick Tyler told CNN the Texas senator had apologized personally to Carson. Tyler said the Cruz team \u201cas a campaign\u201d never alleged Carson was dropping out.<\/p>\n

Carson, who is conspicuously absent in New Hampshire, said the Monday comment amounted to \u201cdirty tricks.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the rehash over Iowa continued, most Republicans were already deep in the fight for New Hampshire, six days away.<\/p>\n

Trump has long held a solid lead in polls in the state, leaving the rest of the field fighting for a second place finish that could crown them the clear Trump alternative.<\/p>\n

The competition for that title is arguably more intense than in Iowa. Ohio Gov. John Kasich, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush have camped out in the state, hoping to salvage their flagging campaigns.<\/p>\n

Iowa gave Rubio a big boost toward establishing himself as the establishment alternative.<\/p>\n

Opening a jam-packed day of campaigning, he told reporters he would \u201ctry to earn the support\u201d Paul\u2019s supporters, though the two Republicans have stark differences on foreign policy.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I respect about Rand, he\u2019s a true and real believer in what he stands for,\u201d Rubio said after a campaign event in Bow.<\/p>\n

Rubio also seemed open to picking off Trump supporters. He\u2019s offered only measured criticism of the billionaire, even when presented with opportunities to unleash. Asked by a disability advocate about Trump\u2019s mockery of a New York Times reporter with a disability, Rubio went relatively easy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we all_obviously not just disagree with it but find it distasteful. I think he\u2019s been called out for that repeatedly and I think people see it for what it is,\u201d He said.<\/p>\n

Rubio\u2019s chief target is Cruz, whose strength with evangelical voters won\u2019t carry him as far in New Hampshire.<\/p>\n

But now Rubio is a target for rivals who have sharpened their attacks.<\/p>\n

Opening a town hall meeting at a pub in Lebanon on Wednesday, Christie labeled the 44-year-old first-term senator as the untested \u201cboy in the bubble\u201d while Christie himself is an old \u201cnicked-up pick-up truck.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t want someone on that stage who looks good in a controlled situation in a TV studio, but when the mud starts to get thrown, all of sudden, looks like a deer in the headlights,\u201d Christie said. \u201cYou want the old, beat-up, nicked-up pick-up truck. … We can\u2019t go with what\u2019s shiny and new, we need to go with what\u2019s tested.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bush, meanwhile, announced the endorsement of former House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. The former Virginia lawmaker, ousted by conservatives in 2014, introduced Bush at a town hall in New London before a large crowd on the campus of Colby-Sawyer College.<\/p>\n

Cantor said Bush sticks \u201cto the principles of limited government\u201d and \u201cis the one who will never let you down.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders tussled over each other\u2019s progressive bona fides. The Clinton campaign pushed back against Sanders\u2019 assertion that the former secretary of state was a progressive on \u201csome days.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA 40-year record of progressive results_boiled down to \u2018some days,\u2019\u201d Clinton tweeted.<\/p>\n

The Democrats are to appear at a CNN town hall Wednesday night.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Associated Press writers Sergio Bustos, Kathleen Ronayne, Jill Colvin, Steve Peoples and Bill Barrow contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BOW, N.H. \u2014 While Donald Trump called for a do-over, Marco Rubio tried to capitalize on his moment in the spotlight<\/a> Wednesday as the shrinking field of Republican presidential hopefuls jockeyed for position in a race rattled by an Iowa surprise. Trump took to Twitter to vent his frustration with the Iowa results that landed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[65],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-33075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-nation-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33075\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33075"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=33075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}