Sen. Marco Rubio on Monday expressed “personal affection” for Jeb Bush and said the former Florida governor would be a strong 2016 contender.
But in an interview with radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt, Rubio reiterated that Bush running for president would have no bearing on his decision about whether to forgo re-election to the Senate and seek the White House. Rubio is looking more and more like a presidential candidate; on Monday, influential New Hampshire GOP operative Jim Merrill, a Mitt Romney loyalist, joined his political operation, a move first reported by the New York Times.
“If we decide to run for president, having someone like Jim on board would be a tremendous asset,” Rubio told Hewitt.
On Bush, sometimes described as Rubio’s political mentor, the senator offered among his most expansive comments to date.
Bush running is an issue for Rubio because both hail from Florida. Bush running for president would appear to eat into Rubio’s Sunshine State fundraising base. Bush running also gives Rubio particular competition for Florida’s prized nominating delegates.
“I think we’re going to have multiple candidates that are of high quality, and Gov. Bush would be one of them,” Rubio said, according to a transcript of the interview. “I wouldn’t be running against Jeb Bush. If I ran, I would run because I believe I’m the right person for the right time in our country’s history. And certainly, voters will make that decision, not me. My job is to go out and do the best I can if I decide to run for president to convince them that that’s me. But I have admiration for him, and continue to have personal affection for him as well. I think he’s going to be a very strong candidate. He’s going to raise a lot of money, has a lot of smart people around him on his team. He’ll be a very significant candidate. But I don’t, I wouldn’t view it as me running against Jeb Bush. I was considering, I would consider running whether he was in the race or not in the race. And so me, it really has nothing to do with him. It has to do about where I feel like I can best serve America at this time in America’s history, and at this time in my life and my career.”
