Sliding In The Polls, Jeb Bush Lashes Out At GOP Frontrunner Again: ‘Donald Trump Is A Jerk’


Someday, Jeb Bush might well look back on his tête–à–tête with Donald Trump and smile. Granted, that “someday” will probably be sometime after a candidate from the 2016 election eventually takes the Presidential Oath of Office, plus a decade or two given the present levels of animus between Trump and Bush. As a frequent target of Trump’s barbed insults and one-liners, Jeb Bush appears tired of playing defense against the real estate mogul’s blustery attacks, and he is now hitting back in public, forsaking political decorum in favor of good, old-fashioned name calling.

As previously reported by Inquisitr, Jeb Bush is apparently so filled up with the hubbub surrounding Donald Trump that he has even considered reneging on a loyalty oath to support the Republican presidential candidate in the event that it is Trump who finishes at the top of the heap. But while Bush himself has not confirmed that he will jump ship in the event of a Trump nomination, the former Florida governor publicly lashed out at Trump on Saturday, clearly irritated with where things stand with respect to the current state of the GOP race.

“Just one other thing — I gotta get this off my chest — Donald Trump is a jerk,” Jeb Bush said at the weekend town hall meeting in Contoocook, New Hampshire. “You cannot insult your way to the presidency,” he said in comments transcribed by CNN.”You can’t disparage women, Hispanics, disabled people. Who is he kidding?”

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Donald Trump gesticulates while Jeb Bush criticizes. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Bush’s comments echo a warning he issued to Donald Trump during the GOP debate earlier in the week in which he chastised his billionaire rival’s penchant for put-downs.

Almost predictably, Donald Trump was less than impressed by Bush’s rejoinder. The reality star turned political juggernaut also pointed to his most recent poll numbers in touting his success thus far.

“Oh yeah, you’re a tough guy. You’re tough. You’re real tough,” Trump said in a video excerpt posted by CNN. “Let’s see; I’m at 42 [per cent] and you’re at three. So far I’m doing better.”

Earlier in the debate, Trump remarked, “With Jeb’s attitude, we will never be great again, that I can tell you.”

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Jeb Bush has recently asserted that Donald Trump can’t insult his way into the presidency, but he has not necessarily ruled out the possibility that Trump might get there by mocking and lampooning. (Photo by Sean Rayford/Getty Images)

Labeling Trump as a “chaos candidate” and dismissing the GOP frontrunner’s most controversial proposals as “not serious,” Jeb Bush took some of his best shots at his rival during the aforementioned debate. By the time he met the crowd in Contoocook on Saturday, he was frank regarding the need to decompress and regroup.

“I feel better now. I gave myself therapy there,” Bush joked after branding Trump a “jerk” while talking to his supporters in new Hampshire. “Thank you for allowing me to do it.”

By all appearances, the Bush campaign is in dire need of much more than a spot of cathartic psychoanalysis. Jeb Bush is currently polling in the single digits in all of the major polls compiled by Real Clear Politics. In polls in Iowa, which will hold the first presidential primary caucus in February 2016, Bush does not crack the top five spots. Similarly, Jeb is barely a factor in the following two primaries, which will take place in New Hampshire and South Carolina, respectively.

Major news outlets have reported that donors to the Bush campaign have been worried for weeks that their candidate will be out of the race after the first spate of primary contests. But in the final quarterly gathering of Bush donors held earlier this month, campaign representatives attempted to reassure stakeholders that Jeb will emerge as a formidable contender once other candidates begin to leave the race in early 2016. It is a tough sell to be sure, as even if Jeb Bush assimilates all of the percentage points below his present standing, he will remain a long way from catching up to his most spirited rival, Donald Trump.

(Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

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