Heilemann: If Rubio Keeps Rising He Could ‘Challenge Trump’ and ‘Come out on Top’

RUSH TRANSCRIPT:
SCARBOROUGH: "Yesterday the two people that had the most heat going for him, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio both have had their worst days on the campaign trail. Marco, for something that Marco didn’t say but Ted Cruz still dealing with a hell of a lot of scar tissue coming out of his win in Iowa. He won ugly and it seems like it might blunt his momentum. Talk about the bizarre day yesterday where the two guys that were the hottest got cooled down."
HEILEMANN: "I think both of those guys didn’t have their best days but neither one of them had a disastrous day. Marco Rubio had to deal with the fact that Rick Santorum on your show yesterday was unable to come up with a accomplishment. Rubio put out a list of what he said were his biggest accomplishments and it was pretty thin beer and he had to answer questions about that. But right now I think the story on Rubio continues to be upward momentum. Despite a lot of attacks by other candidates in the establishment lane no one has punctured that bubble and the other establishment candidates continue to fight among themselves rather than focusing on Rubio. So he’s rising."
SCARBOROUGH: "According to most Republican — let me ask you about that. Trump still around 30 in most of these polls. Rubio’s moving up the other establishment candidates, though, appear to be stuck in the mud, right?"
HEILEMANN: "Yeah, yeah. There’s a little — there’s consensus. If you talk to Republican candidates — their campaigns, I should say, they agree on one thing, Rubio is rising so rapid dry they think there’s a chance that Rubio could beat Trump and end up in first place. That’s the general view. The second thing is the other person who has the best chance of doing well today not tomorrow or the next day because as you said a week is a lifetime in politics is John Kasich. Bush and Christie have nothing going on up here as you hear from candidates looking at internal numbers so that’s sort of where it is. But that Marco Rubio, if he keeps rising is in a position to challenge trump and conceivably come out on top in New Hampshire."