Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul dismissed concerns about his presidential campaign Thursday, calling recent speculation that his campaign is trending downward “fiction.”

Appearing on “The Laura Ingraham Show,” Paul told Ingraham that he is not concerned about his campaign at this stage in the wake of a Politico article detailing his camp’s apparent fall from grace. Paul went on to say that while he is being out-raised financially by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and the “royal Bush family,” he is unnerved.

The Kentucky senator also spoke out against a potential general election matchup between Bush and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, calling it a “disaster” for the GOP.

“You know, I always thought that these magazines were non-fiction and I read that and was like, ‘Man, this would be good fiction,'” Paul said of the Politico piece. “Because, I don’t really read anything that seems to be accurate to fact. I read through and all these things I supposedly did or didn’t do — none of it even pertained to anything I was aware of so it was sort of an article that seemed to be a conclusion looking for some facts.”

“The bottom line is we’re actually pretty pleased with where we are,” Paul told Ingraham. “We’ve continued to be in the top tier of candidates, we’re raising millions of dollars, and probably the best thing we have to argue for our candidacy is because I go places other Republicans won’t go. I’ve been to the south side of Chicago, I’ve been to Detroit, I’ve been to downtown Philadelphia to a boy’s Latin school.”

“We are now beating Hillary Clinton in five states won by President Obama, including Pennsylvania, which hasn’t been won by a Republican since 1988. So, I think we have some good things. Could things be better? Sure,” Paul admitted. “We wish we had as much money as the royal Bush family, but we don’t. And, I don’t think anyone is going to. But, I don’t think he’s going to be able to buy the presidency, and I don’t think he’s made himself inevitable by having $100 million. We have enough to compete and we will compete and we’re going to work hard.”

“There is definitely Bush-Clinton fatigue and there are a lot of voters that will not be excited. I don’t think you’ll have a rousing grassroots that turns out if it’s a Bush-Clinton campaign and I think it’ll be a disaster for us,” Paul said later on. “I think we need to move on to something newer and better, and I like Jeb as a person, but I think that his policies really are too much big government policies and I think we need a conservative. I mean, The biggest problem our country faces is this mounting $18 trillion debt, we add debt a million dollars every minute. That means you need to elect someone who actually has the guts to cut spending.”