In bid to stop Trump, Rubio has party leaders — but not time — on his side

Rubio’s time and his opportunities for victory are quickly running out, according to even his own supporters, who are offering increasingly candid assessments of his chances.

“It’s not going to be easy for Marco Rubio to do it,” said Rep. Peter T. King of New York, who endorsed Rubio on Tuesday. “There is no doubt that right now Trump is the favorite.”

Hasn't won a single contest

With four states having voted, Rubio has not won a single contest or managed to commandingly defeat Cruz, despite his formidable advantages. In South Carolina, he campaigned with a popular governor who had endorsed him. In Nevada, he continually reminded voters of the six years his family had lived in Las Vegas.

Even those who have sketched out possible paths for Rubio to win the nomination acknowledge that they are quirky and slender, dependent on forces mostly outside his control.

And it is only going to become trickier. Rubio faces inhospitable territory next week in the Super Tuesday contests — states like Texas, Alabama, Tennessee and Oklahoma, where Trump could again eclipse him. What could be worse yet for Rubio is these are also states where Cruz is poised to do well.

Needs Kasich to quit race

Rubio, aides said, needs Gov. John Kasich of Ohio to quit the campaign — which he has shown little inclination to do. He needs almost all the supporters of Kasich and Jeb Bush, who dropped out Saturday, to switch their allegiance to him.

And Rubio’s entire strategy could be in mortal danger if he fails to win Florida or Ohio, the two delegate-rich, winner-take-all primaries scheduled for March 15. Trump’s popularity in Florida and Kasich’s home-state advantage in Ohio could put both states out of reach.

With that hazardous map in mind, Rubio’s campaign is making an increasingly explicit, urgent and desperate case to the party’s electorate that it is time to unite behind his candidacy. The campaign is doing so with public gestures and private pleading.

'If it were just Trump versus Rubio'

“A vote against Marco, or for anyone other than Marco is a vote for Donald Trump — and that is a terrible thing,” said Norm Coleman, the former senator from Minnesota who is supporting Rubio after first backing two of his Republican rivals.

In an interview, Coleman said Kasich should leave the race for the good of the party, echoing a memo from Rubio’s campaign manager, who argued a few days ago that Kasich had no realistic pathway to the Republican nomination.

Rubio’s backers speak of basing their hopes on a winnowing of the Republican field, which may not come to pass, at least in time for him to prevail.

“If it were just Trump versus Rubio, Rubio would win that or have a very good shot at winning,” said Tim Pawlenty, a former governor of Minnesota and a Republican presidential candidate in 2012. “It’s not a question of whether he can win it. It’s whether the field will consolidate and give him that chance.”

Wishful thinking

Rubio could still find a way to the nomination. Cruz’s campaign is struggling with a growing image of deceitfulness and Trump remains an unpredictable figure.

Advisers to Rubio are quick to point out that he has placed second in the last two contests, no matter how slim the margin, and that polls show he remains the overwhelming second choice for most Republican voters. Now, after arguing that the results in Iowa and South Carolina effectively narrowed the primary to a three-man race, his team is suggesting that his finish in Nevada has turned it into a two-man contest with Trump.

That may be wishful thinking, particularly given his middling finish in Nevada.

But projecting an aura of victory and confidence, even if the election returns suggest otherwise, is an essential element of the Rubio campaign’s strategy. On Saturday night, even before they knew what the results in South Carolina would be — whether Rubio would finish second or third — campaign officials were acting publicly as if they had won. They distributed news articles about how Rubio was surging, and they reminded voters of the state’s track record in predicting winners.

Trump compared to Pat Buchanan

Still, the Rubio campaign risks underestimating the breadth of Trump’s appeal by dismissing him as the latest incarnation of Pat Buchanan, another conservative populist who made a strong showing with Republican primary voters early on in 1992 but ultimately faltered.

Bush tried to project a similar air of inevitability. Party leaders quickly lined up behind him. The biggest Republican donors signed on. And his supporters were making many of the same arguments Rubio is now: In a topsy-turvy campaign, the safe, sane alternative who would unite the majority of the party that appears to dislike Trump.

Rubio himself has been making this argument, optimistically claiming the nomination is his to lose. “I am going to be the nominee,” he said aboard his campaign plane Monday as he crisscrossed Nevada.

“We’ve shown the capability to grow,” he added. “Six months ago we weren’t at 20 or 25 percent. We were at 6 and 7 and 8 and 9.”

Dozens of endorsements

In a telling sign, he now entertains detailed questions about his path to the nomination almost every day, something he had routinely shied from.

Over the past 48 hours, he has rolled out dozens of endorsements from current and former Republican governors, senators and representatives to showcase what his aides describe as a coalescing of responsible and respected party figures around his candidacy.

But it can sometimes feel like Republicans are falling in line, not in love.

Coleman, the former Minnesota senator, had previously endorsed Sen. Lindsey Graham and then Bush before backing Rubio. And King, the New York representative, held off until Bush exited the race. Nevada’s governor, Brian Sandoval, said Tuesday that he had voted for Rubio, but cautioned against viewing that as an endorsement.

Biggest asset: Rubio isn't Trump

Republican leaders speak warmly of Rubio’s gifts as an orator, his knowledge of foreign policy and the diversity, as a Cuban-American, that he would bring to a Republican Party dominated by white men. “He can communicate the conservative message in a way that is inviting and not scary,” said Pawlenty, the former Minnesota governor. “It draws people in.”

But perhaps Rubio’s biggest asset is that he is not Trump.

“If my kids called people fat pigs, stupid moron, I’d chastise them,” Coleman said. He added that he had a hard time imagining that “our standard-bearer articulating that is going to be appealing to a majority of Americans.”

But with each passing contest, these supporters acknowledge, it becomes harder to make the case that Rubio is capable of winning the general election when he cannot come close to prevailing in a Republican contest.

“Folks recognize that we have time,” Coleman said, “but not a lot of time to right this course and rally around somebody who can win this.”