The 2016 Blast The latest POLITICO scoops and coverage of the 2016 elections. Email Sign Up

Tweets from https://twitter.com/politico/lists/team-politico



Rubio suggests Trump wet his pants on debate stage

Marco Rubio relentlessly mocked Donald Trump on Friday, escalating the attacks he unleashed during Thursday night’s debate and even suggesting the Republican frontrunner may have wet his pants on the stage.

The Florida senator, clearly buoyed by knocking Trump off balance, repeatedly called the billionaire businessman a “con artist” on Friday, first on the morning shows and then at a Dallas rally, where he had the crowd chuckling over his latest barbs.

“He called me Mr. Meltdown. Let me tell you something, last night in the debate during one of the breaks, two of the breaks, he went backstage and he was having a meltdown,” Rubio claimed. ”First he had one of those makeup things applying around his mustache because he had one of those sweat mustaches. Then, then he asked for a full length mirror, I don’t know why because the podium goes up to here (gestures to chest). I don’t know why maybe to make sure his pants weren’t wet.”

And he continued with the attempts to emasculate the real estate mogul whose campaign is largely based on a showing of strength.

"It's time. The charade is up … a tough guy? This guy inherited $200 million. He's never faced any struggle … Donald Trump has never punched anyone in the face. Donald Trump was the first guy that begged for secret service protection. First guy," Rubio said.

Trump himself went on a Twitter tirade on Friday morning, often mangling the spelling of words such as “honer,” “chocker,” and “leightweight" before deleting and correcting the tweets.

Lightweight Marco Rubio was working hard last night. The problem is, he is a choker, and once a choker, always a chocker! Mr. Meltdown. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 26, 2016

Lying Ted Cruz and leightweight chocker Marco Rubio teamed up last night in a last ditch effort to stop our great movement. They failed! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 26, 2016

Rubio read some of the tweets from Trump’s tweetstorm Friday morning, pointing out that Trump had misspelled the word "choker." But Rubio flubbed the joke, accidentally giving Trump credit for correctly spelling the word.

Reading from his phone, Rubio said, “'Lightweight Marco Rubio was working hard last night,' — this is true — 'the problem is he is a choker, and once a choker, always a chocker.'" Rubio added, "He spelled choker, C-H-O-K-E-R."

“How does this guy — not one tweet, three tweets — misspell words so badly? And I only reach two conclusions — number one, that’s how they spell those words at the Wharton School of Business where he went, or number two, just like Trump Tower, he must have hired a foreign worker to do his own tweets.”

After Trump mocked Rubio during a subsequent campaign event in Fort Worth, Texas, the Florida senator kept up his "con man" line, speaking to reporters later in Oklahoma City.

"There is no way we're going to allow the party of Reagan or the conservative movement to be taken over by a con man," Rubio declared, rejecting the notion that Trump would be the nominee.

"He's not going to be the nominee," the senator said, when asked if he would back Trump if he won the nomination. "The Republican Party would be split apart if he became the nominee, because we cannot allow the party of Reagan to be taken over by a con man."

The unrestrained hurling of insults between Rubio and Trump marked another new era in this highly unpredictable campaign season. Rubio had been content so far to sit back and laugh at Trump’s antics from afar. But after Trump delivered three consecutive and decisive wins in New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada, fears have spiked that the businessman could be running away with the Republican nomination. Rubio upped the heat this week. On Thursday night, he cranked it way up.

Rubio on Thursday night dumped a virtual opposition research folder on Trump’s head as he sought to slow the mogul’s momentum going into Super Tuesday.

The Florida senator ripped into Trump for starting a “fake university” he said duped people into borrowing tens of thousands of dollars, for manufacturing his clothing line overseas, for building his empire on the back of his inheritance, for being anti-Israel, and for hiring undocumented immigrants.

While Ted Cruz often faded on the stage, Rubio showed the ease and verbal dexterity that eluded him during the pre-New Hampshire debate that resulted in a bunch of Marco-bots chasing him around on the trail.

He kept it up on Friday morning. “A con artist is about to take over the conservative movement and the Republican Party, and we have to put a stop to it,” Rubio told CBS' "This Morning." “He is wholly unprepared to be president of the United States.”

On the "Today" show on NBC, he repeated the attack. “I mean, this is unreal. Again, this guy is a con artist," Rubio said. "He’s always making things up. No one holds him accountable for it. You have a guy who is being sued right now for fraud for Trump University. I’ve had stories written about my driving record. We had red light camera tickets. I have some guy go back and write a story about how when I was 18 I got arrested or cited, I should say, for drinking beer in a park after hours. He’s being sued for fraud, for defrauding people. Here’s a guy who had to pay a judgment for hiring Polish workers illegally to build Trump Towers.”

But the big question is whether it’s too little, too late. Jeb Bush managed to briefly resurrect his campaign with a “chaos candidate” attack line against Trump, but he ultimately faded and dropped out of the race.

And both Rubio and Cruz are trailing Trump by double digits in many of the dozen states set to vote next Tuesday.

On ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Rubio pushed back against the idea that his anti-Trump push won’t help much at this point.

“I don’t believe that. I think it’s important for people to understand they have a choice to make. Look, if this pattern continues, the conservative movement in the Republican Party will be taken over by a con artist portraying himself as the fighter of the ordinary person fighting for the working man — but he’s spent years sticking it to the working people,” he said.

When asked why he didn't start attacking Trump earlier, the senator responded: "I would prefer not to get into this situation where we’re attacking one another, but the cover he’s getting from the media these days is extraordinary." The media wants Trump to win the nomination, Rubio said, so that Hillary Clinton can win the general election.

“They’re holding back and as soon as he’s the nominee they’ll open up the floodgates and hit him with a bunch of stories. It’s important for Republicans and conservatives to be aware of what is happening," he said.

Rubio adviser Todd Harris told reporters on Thursday night that more attacks would arrive in the coming days and weeks, and he also defended the timing of Rubio’s newly strong anti-Trump posture.

“Well, look, when you have 16, 17, candidates in a race you’re playing like seven-dimensional chess and if you take on one candidate aggressively, you don’t necessarily accrue the benefit of that. We felt like this was the exact right time,” he said.

The super PAC supporting Rubio got the ball rolling on Friday, releasing two new ads. One ad from Conservative Solutions PAC titled “Knows Nothing” hits Trump on comments he’s made about foreign policy.

“Marco Rubio is a recognized foreign policy expert and Donald Trump praises Putin. Doesn’t know what our nuclear weapons triad is. Says he’ll be neutral between Israel and its enemies,” the ad says. “Trump claims he knows about China because there is a Chinese bank in one of his buildings. In today’s world we can’t have a president who knows nothing about foreign policy.”

The other ad called “Fools” uses a Trump quote from his victory speech following a win Nevada — “I love the poorly educated" — in an attempt to show the businessman as a shameless profiteer.

On Friday morning Rubio also projected confidence that he would beat Trump in Florida despite a Quinnipiac University poll that shows Trump with a 44-28 lead.

“We will win Florida. I know our state very well. It is not going to vote for someone like Donald Trump,” he said to the CBS hosts.

Rubio adviser Joe Pounder, who has a reputation as an opposition research guru, mocked Trump's tweets on Friday morning.

For a guy who failed at Trump Airlines, University, Mortgage, and Vodka, he sure does use the term "loser" a lot https://t.co/g03y2qnvtV — Joe Pounder (@PounderFile) February 26, 2016

Want to see a real meltdown? See what happens when @realDonaldTrump gets hold of a company ... 4 bankruptcies!!!! https://t.co/kG21k3J1aG — Joe Pounder (@PounderFile) February 26, 2016

On, Friday afternoon, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie threw a curveball into the race by backing Trump. During a press conference announcing the surprise endorsement, both Trump and Christie attacked Rubio repeatedly — including about makeup.

"He was putting it on with a trowel," Trump said about Rubio applying makeup backstage.

And it was Rubio, not him, who had the "meltdown" at the GOP debate in New Hampshire, Trump said. "That was one of the epic meltdowns. He didn’t know where he was, I thought he was going to die."

"He's desperate," Trump continued, referring now to Rubio's reading of his tweets. "I watched a part of his little act and he's a desperate guy. ... He is not presidential, that I can tell you. ... He is a nervous nelly. ... I've never seen a human being sweat like this man sweats."

Christie chimed in with his own attacks, calling Rubio part of the "D.C. establishment" and painting him as a hypocrite: "I find it fascinating that someone who barely shows up for work ... is going to talk about somebody else being unprepared."

Nick Gass contributed reporting for this story.