Rubio opens war on Cruz

Rubio opens new front in war on Cruz

The Florida senator's camp is attacking his GOP rival as an 'isolationist hawk.'

By Eli Stokols

Marco Rubio, fresh off a primetime brawl with Ted Cruz on Tuesday's debate stage, was on the offense once again on Wednesday, pressing his foreign policy argument that the Texas senator is a dangerous isolationist masquerading as a hawk.

While Cruz turned in a standout debate performance, getting the most speaking time of any candidate, he was quiet Wednesday morning as he found himself under attack from Team Rubio — and facing congressional scrutiny for possibly releasing classified information on the debate stage.

That happened during an exchange with Rubio in which Cruz said that the old NSA surveillance program covered “20 or 30 percent of phone numbers” while the new program "covers nearly 100 percent." “Let me be very careful when answering this, because I don’t think national television in front of 15 million people is the place to discuss classified information,” Rubio responded.

On Wednesday, Sen. Richard Burr, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told reporters he was having his staff examine debate transcripts. "Any time you deal with numbers...the question is 'is that classified or not' or is there an open source reference to it,” Burr said.

Rubio and Cruz, both jockeying for position atop the Republican field in the run-up to the first primary contests in February, are sharpening their contrasts with each other and each landed points at Tuesday night's debate. Cruz took some skin off Rubio for supporting a 13-year path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants as part of the 2013 comprehensive immigration reform effort that he co-authored. Rubio, meanwhile, took Cruz down a few notches for his opposition to government surveillance programs and defense spending bills.

And since the debate ended, Rubio’s campaign and super PAC have been working hard to focus attention on Cruz's vulnerabilities.

On Wednesday morning, while Rubio took to the television airwaves to hit Cruz, the super PAC supporting his candidacy also took aim at the Texas senator. In an email to donors, Conservative Solutions PAC chairmen Warren Tompkins and Jon Lerner spent four paragraphs disparaging Cruz’s debate performance; and then, in the fifth paragraph, looked to draw attention to Cruz’s use of the term “America First,” an isolationist dog whistle to many seasoned political observers, in summing up his foreign policy approach.

“Now, for people who don’t know history, that term is unobjectionable. But Ted Cruz is no dummy,” Tompkins and Lerner write. “He knows what he’s saying when he calls for an “America First” policy. “America First” was the pro-German organization in the 1940s that advocated keeping America out of World War II. It was also the phrase used by Pat Buchanan in his isolationist campaign in 1992.

“Cruz should explain why he is choosing to describe his position in the same way as noted isolationists in American history,” the email continues. “And he should explain why his voting record against our intelligence capabilities and military funding, and his position in favor of anti-American dictators is not in keeping with those harmful chapters in our history.”

A number of conservative foreign policy hands immediately took note of Cruz’s use of the “America First” phrasing in real time Tuesday night. “I'm still stunned Cruz used the phrase ‘America First,’ knowing full well its resonance,” John Podhoretz tweeted. “Big gaffe from @tedcruz ‘I believe in an America first foreign policy.’ So did Charles Lindbergh,” tweeted Eli Lake.

Cruz’s campaign did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The Texas senator, who didn’t appear on television Wednesday morning, is in California for fundraising activity and is expected to hold a press conference later in the day.

The focus on the phrasing is part of a larger attempt by Rubio’s team to cast Cruz not just as an isolationist at a time when growing foreign threats have many conservatives longing for a more muscular U.S. foreign policy, but also as an "isolationist hawk" — a candidate, who, Rubio’s campaign will try to show, is trying to be all things to all people.

Cruz, during the debate Tuesday night in Las Vegas, attempted to thread a delicate needle on foreign policy, vowing repeatedly to “carpet bomb” ISIS into oblivion while expressing a reluctance to get the U.S. bogged down in the Middle East — and making his case largely in tandem with Rand Paul. Rubio’s campaign wasted no time linking Cruz and Paul, referring to them in a fundraising pitch to supporters blasted out right after the debate as “the isolationist tag team duo Ted Cruz and Rand Paul.”

Rubio continued hammering Cruz during the morning talk shows on Wednesday, saying his lack of support for defense spending bills is alarming.

“You know, Ted stood up there and said, ‘I’m gonna utterly destroy ISIS,’" Rubio said during an appearance on Fox News Channel. “Anyone can say that. What are you gonna do it with? And when you support a budget like he does, that dramatically cuts defense spending, when you vote against every defense authorization bill ever presented before you, how can you argue that the bill that pays for the military, that funds our troops and the Iron Dome, how can you then stand there and say that? ‘I’m gonna utterly destroy ISIS,’ but I’m not gonna pay for or support what it would take to utterly destroy ISIS.”

Cruz has continued to vote against the annual defense spending bill, he explained Tuesday night, “because when I campaigned in Texas, I told voters in Texas that I would oppose the federal government having the authority to detain U.S. citizens permanently with no due process. I have repeatedly supported an effort to take that out of that bill, and I honored that campaign commitment.”

Rubio, who has been criticized on the trail for skipping Senate votes, was the only senator absent from the roll call vote passing the legislation this year.