Marco Rubio's surprisingly strong showing in the Iowa caucuses reshuffled the already intense competition in New Hampshire among the Republican establishment candidates, leading some to sharpen their attacks on the Florida senator ahead of next week's primary.
The sense of urgency was on display in Bedford as New Jersey Governor Chris Christie belittled Rubio's toughness, intelligence and even his manhood. "Maybe he'll do more than 40 minutes on a little stage telling everybody his canned speech that he's memorised," Christie said mockingly to reporters.
"This isn't a student council election, everybody. This is an election for president of the United States. Let's get the boy in the bubble out of the bubble."
Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush expanded his line of attacks beyond Donald Trump to include Rubio and Texas Senator Ted Cruz, the winner of Tuesday's Iowa contest. Bush said at a town hall meeting in Rindge that Rubio, 44, and Cruz, 45, did not have the "life experience" to be president.
For the past six weeks, the four mainstream candidates, which also includes Ohio Governor John Kasich, have looked to New Hampshire as their proving ground. But the calculus of all four was changed by Iowa's results, which saw the three governors each end in low single digits while Rubio surged to within one percentage point of Trump, who came in second.
