Giving viewers his initial thoughts concerning Tuesday’s 2016 GOP presidential debate on the 11:00 p.m. Eastern edition of AC360, CNN political commentator and former Obama administration adviser Van Jones opined that Marco Rubio seemed “rattled” for “the first time” and “lost his cool” as he faced “competition” from fellow Senators Ted Cruz and Rand Paul.
Jones also predicted that if the race comes down to Cruz and Rubio, Cruz would prevail since he’s “beating him in Iowa and beating him in the ground game” along with “on the stage tonight.”
Around the 11:18 p.m. Eastern mark, Jones began by stating that “this is the first time I saw Marco Rubio rattled” and was surprised that there wasn’t as much “firepower directed at Trump” following all the “shocking things” he said about Muslims.
Instead, Cruz and Paul went after Rubio who “lost his cool” and revealed “a competition between these two young rising stars” in Cruz and Rubio. In the end, Jones gave his outlook on the race if those two are the ones left standing: “I think if there is a competition between these two young rising stars, not only is Cruz beating him in Iowa and beating him in the ground game, he beat him on the stage tonight. That’s bad for Rubio.”
Roughly three minutes earlier, former Clinton administration official and Hillary Clinton super PAC head Paul Begala bemoaned the GOP for supposedly resorting to a “dominant emotion” of “fear” to scare Americans in the aftermath of terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino.
The relevant portion of the transcript from CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 Post Debate Special on December 15 can be found below.
CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 Post Debate Special
December 15, 2015
11:18 p.m. Eastern
VAN JONES: Two things. First of all, I thought that this is the first time I saw Marco Rubio rattled. Listen, there was a competition — for some reason, a lot of times they let it go with Trump, you would expect with Trump being the front runner and having said shocking things about Muslims you had seen more firepower directed at Trump. You saw, in fact, more cross fire between Rubio and Cruz. I thought — you want to go? Okay. Listen, I thought that Rubio for the first time on a debate stage, lost. I thought, for the first time on a debate stage, he looked rattled. He was getting hit by Cruz and he was getting hit on the other side by Rand Paul and he lost his cool, so I think if there is a competition between these two young rising stars, not only is Cruz beating him in Iowa and beating him in the ground game, he beat him on the stage tonight. That’s bad for Rubio.
