Bitter Pill...

Friendship battered, Bush faces pressure to back Rubio

Florida politicos scrambled on whether the senator will win the former governor’s endorsement.

By Marc Caputo and Alex Isenstadt

In the waning days of Jeb Bush’s presidential bid, his campaign became all about Marco Rubio, the one-time political understudy who went on to whip him Saturday night in South Carolina. Bush’s allies and his team obsessed about the Florida senator, using him as their benchmark for success — no matter that Donald Trump was the man running at the front of the pack.

And even after Bush’s exit from the 2016 contest, this Florida drama – the primary within a primary — isn’t over: the state’s politicos now want to know if Bush will endorse the man he long called a friend, the man he said in 2012 should be his party’s vice-presidential nominee.

"He is going to relax, think things through and see what he wants to do, if anything," said Al Cardenas, a longtime Bush confidant who served under the former Florida governor as chair of the state GOP.

In the final days leading up to the South Carolina primary, those close to the former Florida governor – donors, staffers, friends – heard him launch private broadsides against Rubio, sometimes in strikingly personal overtones. Others say Bush refrained from ever speaking ill of Rubio in private. And while the tension between them has led some Republicans to suggest Bush might instead put his support behind John Kasich, those close to Bush said on Saturday night such an endorsement was unlikely.

For many Bush backers — the large number of whom always saw Rubio as a second choice — there’s not a moment to spare. That’s because Floridians are already voting by absentee ballot heading into the state’s March 15 primary, which has 99 winner-take-all delegates at stake. As of Friday, more than 105,000 Republicans had voted. That’s less than a third of the absentee ballots that consultants expect will be cast.

With Bush out of the race, polling shows, Rubio has a far better chance of winning Florida, where Trump still leads. But though Bush has withdrawn from the race, his name will be on the ballot through Election Day.

Bush’s failure to endorse Rubio would mark the biggest rift in Florida Republican politics. Rubio in the Florida House served under Bush and backed his agenda. Bush spoke at Rubio’s designation ceremony to become Florida House speaker, a post he assumed in 2007 and used to hire former Bush staffers and carry on Bush’s legacy. In 2012, Bush was vocal in supporting Rubio, who was on GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s shortlist to become his running mate.

“A Bush endorsement would be nice, a nice gesture and a sign there’s peace in the land,” said a top Rubio supporter.

Bush isn’t the only one who is undecided. One person close to New York Jets owner Woody Johnson, Bush’s finance chair, said he wasn’t throwing his support to anyone yet either.

“Let’s face it: No one knows what’s going to happen. There are a lot of hard feelings,” said a Florida House Republican. “We’ll have to wait till the dust settles. Make that, the dirt. Once the dirt settles.”

And there was a lot of it thrown from Bush’s allies. Rubio’s team estimates that of the $34.4 million in negative ads in this race spent against him, $26.9 million – or 78 percent — were funded by the Bush-backing Right to Rise super PAC and Bush's campaign.

Some of the anger at Bush’s sinking fortunes was trained not on Rubio, but on the man who ran Right to Rise, Mike Murphy, the outspoken Hollywood-based political consultant who predicted Bush was the best candidate and once called Trump a “false zombie front-runner.” Since then, Trump has won two early states and Bush never cracked third place, despite a $150 million campaign effort.

“I was told Mike Murphy was a political magician, and now I believe it,” Florida House Speaker-designate Richard Corcoran said. “He took the most transformational, courageous, conservative governor of the modern era and made him look like a moderate – all so he could be viable in a general election that he’ll never be in.”

On Saturday, though, Rubio was gracious in describing Bush, referring to him as the “greatest governor in the history of Florida.”

In his concession speech Saturday night, Bush didn’t look bitter at all. He sounded as if he surprised the crowd when he abruptly announced he was quitting the race, which many expected Sunday or Monday.

A smattering of audible gasps followed the announcement.

“Yeah,” Bush assured them. “Yeah.”

That’s when Bush choked back tears.

Bush has almost cried before at the lectern on election night. The last time was a happier affair. It was 2010 and he was celebrating the defeat of his successor as Florida governor — Charlie Crist, who was once the embodiment of the political establishment. The man who beat Crist, Marco Rubio, Bush’s friend whom he introduced onstage at his Coral Gables victory party.

“Bushes get emotional,” Bush said. My wife has told me, ‘Don’t cry. Don’t cry.’ Marco Rubio makes me cry for joy.”

Six years later, Rubio made Bush cry for a far-different reason.