MANCHESTER, N.H. — Marco Rubio pre-gamed with supporters at a Super Bowl 50 watch party Sunday evening, making another pitch for the White House just 36 hours until voting begins in the crucial presidential primary here.
The Florida senator is an avid football fan. He was introduced to voters who gathered to see him at an indoor sports complex in Manchester by Robert Konrad, a friend and supporter who is a New Hampshire native and retired player for the Miami Dolphins of the National Football League. Rubio is a big Dolphins fan, and has been joking throughout the weekend that he hasn’t had much to cheer about on Super Bowl Sunday for quite sometime.
The line gets laughs in the Granite State, where most are fans of the New England Patriots, which has won four Super Bowl championships since 2001.
“My team isn’t in the Super Bowl, and they haven’t been since, like, 1984,” Rubio said, early Sunday during a town hall meeting in Londonderry. “I know, you guys have been there a lot more than me. But you know, [New England Patriots quarterback] Tom Brady’s going to retire when I’m president. I’m going to offer him a cabinet position, yes I am. [Head Coach] Bill Belichick, too, by the way.”
Rubio pushed back Sunday against criticism that he was too focused in last night’s debate on making his point that President Obama has been effective in changing what is special about the U.S., through legislation like the Affordable Care Act and international agreements like the deal with Iran to limit that country’s nuclear weapons program.
Rubio stumbled in Saturday evening’s televised debate when New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie accused him of being too inexperienced for the presidency, as evidenced by his reliance on canned lines in his speeches. Rubio responded by repeating the Obama talking point, earning the media’s scorn and skepticism from some Granite State voters.
However, some of them were reassured and still on board with the senator after attending one of his three rallies Sunday.
“I was leaning towards him, but what he said – it’s the first time I’ve heard him speak in person,” said Al Nunes, 64, a registered independent from Wilmot. “And what I wanted to hear was him address the confrontation he had with Christie last night. He did it indirectly, but he addressed it to my satisfaction. Based on that fact, he swayed me — took me from leaning to definite.
“I thought Christie was fair in his comments,” Nunes added. “Christie challenged Rubio; fair enough. Rubio needed to respond; he was not very good last night, in that response. That made me wonder a little bit.”
Rubio showed no signs of being hobbled during his rallies Sunday. He began the day in Londonderry before a crowd of about 1,000, continued in Bedford with a capacity attendance of 700, plus around 100 in an overflow room, and capped the day before more than 500 at his Super Bowl watch party. He vowed to continue to press his point about Obama, no matter how much criticism doing so draws. Rubio was running second in most New Hampshire polls as of Sunday.
“I don’t care how much it annoys people in the media,” Rubio said in Manchester. “We are going to keep saying it, Barack Obama is trying to change America.”
