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Politics Foreign Affairs Culture Fellows Program

The Florida Senate Race and Rubio’s Obvious Presidential Ambitions

Rubio will be lucky to keep the job that he claimed not to want anymore.
rubio face

For some reason, Ashe Schow isn’t buying Rubio’s claim that his re-election bid isn’t preparation for a future presidential campaign:

“It’s not the safest route forward. I’m running for re-election because I’m going to be a senator,” he added. “I’m going to spend six years in the Senate making my mark on behalf of the people of Florida, but also on behalf of the things that are important for America.”

Mmmmhmmm. This coming from the guy who for months said he wasn’t going to run for re-election.

Given Rubio’s past reversals and reputation for opportunism, it’s difficult to take his denials seriously. It is even harder to take those denials seriously when it seems obvious that the reason he decided to seek re-election after all was to position himself for a 2020 presidential run. It will be up to Floridians to decide if they want to send Rubio back to the Senate, but I wouldn’t be surprised if most of them are already tired of his ambitions for higher office. They may not be satisfied with the “mark” (or lack thereof) he’s made on their behalf in his first term, and may not want to give him another chance.

If Rubio does intend to run for president again (and everyone assumes that he does), he isn’t likely to benefit from being in the Senate. Josh Zeitz reviewed the record of unsuccessful first-time presidential candidates that returned to the Senate before a second run, and he noted that none of them was successful in later attempts:

More to the point, while many senators have run for the presidency and lost, a handful of onetime presidential aspirants have returned to the Senate after leaving it (or, in Rubio’s case, almost leaving it)—only to run for president again. Of those returnee candidates, none was successful in using the Senate as a platform for another run at the White House. Some found it impossible to shake off the loser’s reputation. Others found themselves bumped aside by newer, younger models.

Another recent example that Zeitz didn’t mention was Bob Dole, but if anything Dole’s example should be even more sobering for Rubio. Dole ran for president in 1980 and 1988, losing both times and returning to the Senate after each loss. He briefly became majority leader in the mid-’80s and again after the ’94 midterms. He ran again in 1996 and secured the nomination before being handily defeated in the general election. That is the most that Rubio can reasonably hope for, and even that would require putting in a lot more time in the Senate before he will be able to mount a credible campaign.

Most candidates that have done as poorly in their first presidential run as Rubio did usually don’t bother with a second one. If Rubio hadn’t made the mistake of running for president this year, his chances in a future election cycle would probably be much better. As it is, he’ll be lucky to keep the job that he claimed not to want anymore.

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