ANKENY, Iowa— Republican insiders in early-voting states say a crucial battle is emerging in the 2016 presidential race between Marco Rubio and Scott Walker, competing to establish themselves as the party’s “bridge” candidate who can appeal to both the establishment and grass-roots activists.

As it has become increasingly apparent that they are key rivals, the men have started taking regular, subtle but unmistakable, shots at one another. Walker talks about the need to nominate someone who is not from Washington and implicitly compares Rubio to Barack Obama. Rubio suggests that there is “no way” a governor like Walker is prepared to deal with global crises facing the United States.


Dozens of interviews on the ground in the early states, backed up by recent polling, find many Republicans torn between Walker and Rubio.

A Public Policy Polling survey this week shows Walker and Rubio in first and second place in Iowa. “The key to Walker’s success is that he’s winning both among voters who are most concerned about electability in the general election and among voters who are most concerned with having the most conservative candidate,” the Democratic firm said in a release explaining the numbers. Rubio and Walker tied in the poll for being the most frequent second choice of voters.

“That’s a really interesting matchup,” said Jack Whitver, an uncommitted state senator who hosted Rubio at his home here for an ice cream social this weekend.

Rubio and Walker differ in many ways—a blue-collar Midwesterner who shops at Kohl’s; the son of Cuban immigrants who is married to a former Miami Dolphins cheerleader – but they are trying to woo an overlapping group of voters. There is a large bloc of establishment-minded activists who do not want to support Jeb Bush for the nomination out of dynasty and electability concerns, and there is a swath of deeply-conservative voters who love guys like Ted Cruz or Mike Huckabee but won’t support them because they want a nominee who they believe can win the general election.

“I don’t know how we characterize our opponent as a relic of the 20th century and then nominate a relic of the 20th century,” said Bob Brownell, a county supervisor in Iowa’s Polk County, which includes Des Moines. “It’s got to be Rubio or Walker in my mind. Walker has that executive experience; Marco doesn’t have that, but what he does have is a 21st century perspective.”

Walker, 47, and Rubio, 43, are also each presenting themselves as next-generation candidates.

“Of the leftovers from last time, I still like Huckabee and Santorum. Of the new faces, I like Walker and Rubio,” said Doug Brown, 69, a retired product engineer who spent his career at John Deere in Iowa.

Brown caucused for Santorum in 2012 and is now uncommitted. He praised Walker’s “accomplishments” and “proven record.” In the next breath, he praised Rubio’s rhetorical abilities. “He seems to have a good understanding of what’s wrong with the country and how to fix it,” Brown said, stressing that he’s undecided.

Attendees at a Manchester, New Hampshire, house party for Rubio the weekend before echoed the some points. “I’m probably between Scott Walker and Marco Rubio,” said John Cebrowski, a former state representative from Bedford. “We need fresh ideas and both have them … This is not a dynasty. We’re not talking about the Romanovs or the Windsors. We need some freshness.”

Rick Kimberley, a corn and soybean farmer from north of Des Moines who caucused for Romney in 2012, floated the idea that Rubio and Walker would be great running mates — sort of like in 1992, when Bill Clinton and Al Gore together offered a youthful contrast to George H.W. Bush.

“I’m not predicting right now which one’s going to come out on top,” said Kimberley, 60.

Many point to stylistic similarities.

“They’re conservative, but reasonable and measured in tone for the most part,” said Jamie Burnett, an uncommitted GOP strategist in New Hampshire.

The two candidates rarely take each other on directly in public, but their comments seem closely tailored to emphasize their relative strengths and the other’s weaknesses.

Rubio constantly invokes his seats on the Senate Foreign Affairs and Intelligence committees to argue that he would be ready on his first day as president to tackle ISIS and other global threats. He told the Des Moines Register editorial board on Saturday there is “no way” a governor could be equipped with the world as tumultuous as it is.

“Governors can certainly read about foreign policy, and take briefings and meet with experts, but there is no way they’ll be ready on Day One to manage U.S. foreign policy,” Rubio said.

A few hours later, Walker fired back. “I think he’s questioning how Ronald Reagan was ready,” he told reporters after an appearance at the Machine Shed restaurant. “Governors innately have the ability to lead. We are required every day to use our cabinet to make decisions, not just give speeches; not to just travel to foreign places, but to ultimately make decisions.”

On Hugh Hewitt’s radio show recently, Walker noted explicitly that Obama also sat on the Foreign Affairs committee before he was elected president.

The posturing is breaking through and sparking discussion at the activist level.

“There’s some discussion as to which of those two categories of experience is best suited to take on the presidency and more particularly to take on Hillary Clinton,” said New Hampshire Republican Ray Chadwick, who previously chaired the Hillsborough County GOP.

On the issues front, the biggest dividing line between the two candidates is immigration. Rubio co-sponsored the 2013 Senate bill that included a pathway to citizenship. Walker has changed his position to take a hard line against immigration.

At a five-hour cattle call for social conservatives at a church in Waukee Saturday night, Rubio went first and Walker went last. Rubio did not mention immigration during his speech. Walker made a point of criticizing even lawful immigration on the grounds that it drives down the wages of workers who are already here. This puts him to the right of even someone like Cruz.

The further to the right that Walker continues to tack in order to compete for the Religious Right and to win over people who might otherwise support Huckabee, Santorum or Cruz in the low-turnout caucuses, the bigger the opening he leaves for Rubio to establish himself as the bridge candidate.

“They’re both trying to pitch themselves as candidates who will be agreeable to all factions of the party,” said University of New Hampshire political scientist Dante Scala. “They’re both trying to pull off the same trick.”

It’s a tricky balancing act. Brownell, the Polk County supervisor, said he’s leaning to Rubio over Walker, partly because “he’s in the right place completely when it comes to immigration,” a reminder that not every Republican is against reform.

The two candidates heavily emphasize that they are electable, but their pitch is quite different.

Rubio leans on his Hispanic roots and his allies argue that he could more easily carry Sun Belt states like Florida and Nevada. He says his family epitomizes the American Dream. “I didn’t read about it in a book,” he says.

Walker also employs his own strain of identity politics, arguing during his latest swing through Iowa that he could carry the state in a general election. “For a Republican to win the presidency, the pathway is through the Midwest,” he said. “You need states like Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio … Having a good, common-sense reform-minded governor from the Midwest wouldn’t be a bad thing.”

Cate Martel contributed to this report from Manchester, N.H.