Rick Joyner Tackles the Question: Why Is Marco Rubio’s Campaign Failing?
Rick Joyner, founder and executive director of MorningStar Ministries and Heritage International Ministries, took to social media over the weekend to opine about the apparent rejection of U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio’s presidential campaign.
“Why is Rubio’s campaign failing?” he asked in a Facebook post. “He is brilliant, articulate, good looking, with a beautiful family, and he’s a strong Christian with a bold testimony. He would very likely have been almost a shoe in for the nomination without his participation in the ‘Gang of Eight’ that proposed amnesty for illegal immigrants. That is not the unforgivable sin with Republicans, but it is a big one, especially when it is contrary to what you ran on.”
Joyner, who is also president of The Oak Initiative, an interdenominational movement that mobilizes Christians to engage in the great issues of our time, noted the Florida senator was once a Tea Party favorite until he appeared to cave on basic issues he had run on seemingly just to fit in with the party leadership in Washington.
“This is what almost everyone who gets elected seems to do, and the people have had it with this,” he said. “Marco had such high expectations as a true conservative leader that it was seen as an even more grievous betrayal. Phyllis Schlafly, known and greatly respected as ‘the mother of the conservative movement’ wrote a scathing article on the betrayals of Rubio.”
Conservatives are sick of those who only claim to be conservatives, but compromise their beliefs and become something else once they get to Washington, Joyner said. Voters have rightly questioned, he added, what would make Rubio do any differently if he was elected president?
“With the baggage of his record going from the hope of the conservative movement to the hope of the establishment, he was still doing quite well on the strength of his performance in the debates,” he said. “He got more help when Bush attacked him so ruthlessly, and he stood up to his old mentor. This gave some hope that maybe he was now getting some backbone. Then he had the debate meltdown that made him appear to be an automaton. Even then he started making a comeback until he got down in the gutter with Trump and started acting like Trump. That is not who Marco is, and it was not pretty.”
Joyner concluded that was probably the last piece of evidence voters needed that “given the conditions it appears that Rubio will try to morph into what he thinks he needs to be.”
“What is working for Trump is not his offensive manners, but his boldness, courage and being who he is regardless of how politically incorrect it is,” he concluded. “It’s that courage to actually stand for what you claim to believe that Rubio needs.”