Rubio dampens New Hampshire expectations as he says he could finish in 'second, third, fourth' and only the media is 'fixated' on his robotic debate disaster
- Rubio on defense, insists hes going to do well in South Carolina after the dust settles in New Hampshire
- Insists he'll keep on repeating his anti-Obama talking points
- Claims voters will look past the disastrous exchange with Chris Christie during Saturday's debate
- New Hampshire voters are casting primary ballots on Tuesday in a contest Donald Trump is expected to win
- Rubio tried to downplay his own finish, saying he could finish as low as fourth place in an eight-candidate field
Marco Rubio downplayed his chances of a strong finish in New Hampshire on the morning of the first-in-the-nation primary election, saying he has no idea where he will finish – and it could be in as low as fourth place.
'I don't know where we're going to finish, in terms of second, third, fourth,' Florida's junior senator said on ABC's 'Good Morning America.' program.
'I know [Donald] Trump is a clear front-runner. I mean, he's been in first place since June.'
Final pre-election polling in the Granite State shows Rubio jostling with three other candidates – Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.
THE EXPECTATIONS GAME: Marco Rubio said Tuesday morning that he might finish in fourth place in the New Hampshire primary
POLL TROLL: Rubio campaigned Tuesday morning as voting booths opened across New Hampshire but he was shadowed by several protesters in 'robot' costumes
'You've got some people who haven't campaigned anywhere else but here. You know, their whole campaign is built here,' Rubio said, in an apparent swipe at Kasich – and at New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who took him to the woodshed in Saturday's debate for repeating talking points about President Barack Obama in the face of blistering criticism.
The uneven performance earned him a nickname: Rubio the 'robot.' He's been trying to shake that image for three days and restore confidence in voters who saw a strong third-place finish in Iowa and might have vaulted him into second place in New Hampshire.
'Oh, look – first of all I doubt that it gave many people pause,' Rubio said in full damage-control mode. 'It was a debate, and we did great in that debate.'
'If you look at, by every metric that we looked at, from fundraising to interest on the Web to Google searches, we had a very strong debate. The media is fixated on the first ten minutes, but the voters are looking at the totality of it. Especially in a place like New Hampshire.'
MARCO ROBOTO: Rubio insisted he'll keep hammering home his talking points even though the media is 'fixated' on how much trouble he got into during Saturday's debate by doing just that
It was that first ten-minute blitzkrieg, including a vicious broadside from Christie when Rubio fell back repeatedly on his contention that Obama is consciously damaging America, that defined his debate performance, however.
But Rubio seemed to be saying he's hammering home his Obama lines on purpose, no matter what.
'I'm not going to stop saying what I'm saying,' he insisted.
'I mean, we believe – my whole campaign is built on this idea that the country's headed in the wrong direction as a result of deliberate policies put in place by this president to change the relationship of government to our economy and America's role in the world.'
'So I'm going to keep – that is the core of our campaign. We look forward to continuing to say that.'
Monday in Nashua, New Hampshire, Rubio repeated many of his stock stump-speech lines, including smoe he delivered almost word-for-word identically a year ago in the same city.
TOUGH TO SHAKE: His 'robot' reputation has given far-left groups like American Bridge 21st Century ample room to mock Rubio on the campaign trail
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