As far back as April 2015, political pundits have been referring to Florida Sen. Marco Rubio as the second choice for the Republican nomination. Nearly a year later, it's looking more and more like that prophecy has come true.

Rubio has a lot going for him in a general election: He's a young, fresh-faced Senator from a swing state that has, at least in recent years, tended to be the deciding factor in presidential elections. His Hispanic ethnicity provides an opportunity for the Republican Party to expand its voting base, which is much needed after winning only 27 percent of Latinos in 2012 to Obama's 71 percent.

But there are strikes against him as well: Although Rubio is the GOP establishment's top candidate, the insurgent rise of Donald Trump and, to a lesser extent Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, goes to show how little Republican voters care what their party's elders have to say.



Rubio has simply been unable to secure a large voting bloc that's truly his own.

Rubio's general demeanor can be described as cool, collected and, at times, calculated. That may be the winning strategy in most elections – it certainly worked out for then-Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry when he faced off with sometimes-explosive Howard Dean, a former governor of Vermont, for the Democratic nomination in 2004.

However, Rubio is competing with the more incendiary language of Trump and Cruz, two candidates beating him in the delegate count. Couple that with the fact that – according to Pew Research Center – 79 percent of Republicans feel their side "loses" more often than it wins, and it doesn't exactly bode well for the Florida senator.

Rubio has been endorsed by 14 senators and five governors, more than any other candidate running for the GOP nomination. However, endorsements have guaranteed nothing in this election cycle. The only two endorsements that had an effect in the primaries so far were Texas Gov. Greg Abbott's endorsement of Cruz and Alabama Sen. Jeff Session's endorsement of Donald Trump, who swept most of the South without the added boost an endorsement is supposed to give.

The end result is a candidacy that is nobody's first choice.

U.S. News analyzed campaign contributions – obtained through the Federal Election Commission – by ZIP code for Rubio, Cruz, Trump, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. In 11 of the top 25 ZIP Codes that contributed to Rubio did his campaign get the lion's share of the money. Clinton, for instance, out-raised Rubio in his top ZIP code 90210 – Beverley Hills – by $289,368.



After 26 contests, Rubio has managed to turn out a majority of voters in only Minnesota, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia. Rubio's delegate wins extend beyond just those three contests, but even victories at the micro level do not show the promise of a long-lasting Republican campaign.

Result tabulation by the Associated Press shows Rubio's top margins of victory in Northern Virginia, the Atlanta metropolitan area and the Twin Cities in Minnesota. While winning is always good, there's are a couple of things worth noting here.



One is that these areas are highly Democratic and are not likely to vote for a Republican in a general election. Although presidential elections are not generally determined by how major metropolitan areas swing, it does suggest that the people who like Rubio best, at least within the Republican Party, are more liberally minded.

But the fact that Republican voters are leaning so heavily toward Cruz and Trump suggests that a candidate backed by the party's more liberal-to-moderate members was not bound to survive the primary process. According to Pew, 53 percent of Republicans are opposed to granting illegal immigrants a path to citizenship. That's not exactly great news for a senator whose best known legislative contribution is his backing of a bill that would have done just that.



Another potential problem for Rubio is the fact that the areas in which he has the highest support are financially well off. According to the U.S. Census, the average household income from 2010 to 2014 for Rubio's top reporting areas was $91,395 – well over the national average of $74,596. But middle America, for the most part, is not so well off. Gallup's economic confidence index for 2015 suggests the South – the GOP's most reliable voting bloc – is not happy with its financial situation.

Trump and Cruz are beating Rubio by a wide margin in less-affluent areas. Eight of the 10 least financially confident states – Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Alabama, Wyoming, Mississippi, Alaska and Kentucky – have already voted and none have swung for Rubio. Missouri votes on Tuesday and Rubio is not expected to compete there. West Virginia, the state with the least economic confidence, votes on May 10.

Conversely, the state with the highest economic confidence in 2015 was Minnesota – the state that gave Rubio his first and only win.