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Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump is going after GOP primary rivals Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush for polls showing them trailing the businessman in their home state. "We're leading in Florida against a sitting senator, right - a sitting senator," Trump said at a rally in Sarasota, Fla., on Saturday. "So we are beating a sitting senator who never votes for Florida," he added. "And think of this, we're leading against an ex-governor, Bush - Bush, in favor of Common Core, can you believe you're in favor of Common Core?"

<p>Republican presidential candidate front-runner Donald Trump returns to Florida for a campaign rally on Saturday.</p> <p>Trump's rally will be held at the Robarts Arena in Sarasota, beginning at noon. He last visited Florida last month when he made stops before large crowds in Miami and Jacksonville.</p>

The 2013 Gang of Eight comprehensive immigration reform bill is the signature achievement of Marco Rubio's four years and ten months in the U.S. Senate. Yet in the first four Republican presidential debates, in which Rubio has played an increasingly prominent role, he has not been asked even once about the specifics of the legislation. Despite that omission, it seems likely that if Rubio continues to rise in the GOP race, someone, somewhere will pay attention to his most important accomplishment. The 1,197-page Gang of Eight bill is so far-reaching, and at the same time so detailed, that it provides...

There's fresh evidence here of the unthinkable: Florida's biggest Republican stars, former governor Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio, run the risk of losing their state's winner-take-all primary next year to an out-of-state contender. A loss in their home state could force both Bush and Rubio out of the presidential race after March 15, when Florida and three other states will hold the first winner-take-all primaries.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), who received widespread praise for his Tuesday debate performance in which he slammed the media for its biased coverage of immigration, continued his verbal broadside against pro-amnesty special interests on today's program of the Laura Ingraham Show. In perhaps his most detailed comments to date criticizing donor-class favorite Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), Ted Cruz gave a crushing assessment of Rubio's involvement in co-authoring the La Raza-backed Gang of Eight bill. Cruz outlined Rubio's coordinated effort with Chuck Schumer to sabotage conservative efforts to add popular amendments to the Obama-championed measure: -snip- Cruz told Ingraham that while...

Candidate says he is open to 'very long' path to citizenship for immigrants. Marco Rubio insisted he learned his lesson when he abandoned his controversial immigration bill: Congress could not tackle such an issue in a comprehensive fashion. But on the campaign trail, Rubio says he's open to the most controversial aspect of that plan: a pathway to citizenship for the nation's 11 million undocumented immigrants. Rubio laid out this week a list of criteria illegal immigrants would have to meet to earn citizenship -- mirroring the controversial Gang of Eight bill that he has methodically been distancing himself from...

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) declared Thursday that "people will have to be deported" before Congress can move forward on immigration reform. Rubio, whose past support for comprehensive immigration reform has been in the spotlight as he's risen in the GOP primary polls, said Americans would be skeptical of any attempts to revisit reform until the nation shows it's committed to enforcing current laws. "We are going to have to deport some people, otherwise if you're not going to enforce the law, what's the point of having those laws?," Rubio said on Fox's "America's Newsroom." "Criminals are going to be deported....

Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida said Thursday that while some illegal immigrants will have to be deported, it's unrealistic to think it can happen for all of the approximately 11 million in the United States. Mr. Rubio was asked if he would accept or denounce 2016 GOP presidential rival Donald Trump's tough deportation plan, and the Florida senator said both sides have valid points to make. "We are going to have to deport some people - otherwise, if you're not going to enforce your laws, what's the point of having those laws?" Mr. Rubio said on Fox News' "America's Newsroom."...

Sen. Marco Rubio clarified his view on the 11 million immigrants, who are in the United States illegally. The day after a presidential debate, which exposed a continuing divide in the Republican Party on immigration, Rubio told NPR on Wednesday that he favors a path to citizenship for some, though the prospect would be very distant. "If you haven't been here very long, or you're a criminal, you will be deported," Rubio told NPR's Morning Edition. "Otherwise, you will have to come forward, pass the background check, learn English, pay a fine, because you violated the law, start paying taxes,...

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) is defending his participation in drafting the "Gang of Eight" Senate amnesty bill, which offered illegal immigrants a path to American citizenship by allowing them to apply for a green card. In an interview with Sean Hannity last night, Rubio explained that he was "trying to make a difference" by participating in the 2013 process with liberal Democratic Senators like Chuck Schumer to create the "most conservative bill possible" in a Democratic led Senate. "What we underestimated is how much people distrust the federal government," he said, pointing out that Americans demanded border security first before...

Sen. Marco Rubio clarified his view on the 11 million immigrants, who are in the United States illegally. The day after a presidential debate, which exposed a continuing divide in the Republican Party on immigration, Rubio told NPR Wednesday he favors a path to citizenship for some, though the prospect would be very distant. "If you haven't been here very long, or you're a criminal, you will be deported," Rubio told NPR's Morning Edition. "Otherwise, you will have to come forward, pass the background check, learn English, pay a fine, because you violated the law, start paying taxes, and you'll...

If there was any doubt that one of the storylines to watch in Tuesday night's Republican presidential debate will be the intensifying battle between Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio, it should be gone after a sequence of events that entangled the two campaigns Monday night. After the New York Times reported that the pro-Bush super PAC Right to Rise USA has filmed an attack video claiming Rubio's hard-line stance on abortion makes him unelectable and its top strategist has shown a willingness to unleash as much as $20 million worth of ads targeting the Florida senator, Rubio's campaign tried to...

Aides to Jeb Bush and the super PAC backing him are so freaked out and betrayed by Sen. Marco Rubio's rise in the Republican presidential polls and Bush's decline, they are setting aside up to $20 million to sink Rubio's campaign and previewing an attack ad criticizing Bush's former protege as too extreme on abortion to get elected president, report Maggie Haberman and Michael Barbaro at The New York Times, citing at least three people "privy to" discussions and preparations in the Bush camp. Bush and Rubio are facing off in a Republican debate on Tuesday, and given how poorly...

The Marco Rubio campaign is making the most out of the blockbuster story in today's New York Times about the Jeb Bush campaign about to go nuclear on Rubio. Specifically, Right to Rise, Bush's super PAC, is apparently ready to spend $20 million in attacking Rubio. "Part of running for president is you have to put your big boy pants on and get vetted on the issues, so we know we don't have a dud candidate running against Hillary Clinton," Right to Rise chief strategist Mike Murphy told the Times. Forget whether the strategy makes any sense - who could...

Republican senators are coming around to the view that Jeb Bush is unlikely to win the party's nomination for president and that freshman Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.) is the most viable prospect for the general election. Rubio has had plenty of support among Beltway pundits since the outset of his campaign but Bush's poor performance in the last Republican debate, together with his declining poll numbers, have begun to shift sentiment in even the upper echelons of the GOP's establishment. "Marco's in the driver's seat. There's a lot of disappointment in Bush's performance," said one Republican senator, who requested anonymity...

Marco Rubio's campaign office released Saturday new details on some of the personal charges the 2016 GOP presidential candidate made using an American Express card issued by the Republican Party of Florida. New statements from 2005 to 2006 show Mr. Rubio used the credit card to pay for a portion of a trip to Las Vegas, auto repairs, tiling and charges at a children's sports activity center.

One of Florida's top GOP fundraisers officially quits Bush team, signals shift to Rubio. Jeb Bush's decision to attack old friend and new rival Marco Rubio is backfiring, pushing important supporters to criticize the campaign's tactics and driving one of Florida’s top fundraisers to officially quit and signal a shift in allegiance to the senator. "I think the world of Jeb Bush. He was a great governor of Florida and is a really good person, but the campaign has hijacked his message" said Brian Ballard, a Tallahassee lobbyist who contributed more than $25,000 of his own money and has raised...

U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio charged grocery bills, repairs to the family minivan and purchases from a wine store less than a mile from his West Miami home to the Republican Party of Florida while he was speaker of the Florida House, according to records obtained by The Miami Herald/St. Petersburg Times. Rubio said Wednesday that he paid for all personal expenses billed to an American Express card given to him by the party to use from 2005 to 2008, when he left public office. The rest of the charges, he said, were legitimate party expenses. Those expenses include a...

Marco Rubio's use of a Republican Party of Florida American Express card is only part of the story. Over the course of his rise in politics, the Tampa Bay Times and partner Miami Herald chronicled his background and controversies. The most detailed accounting of Rubio's AmEx charges is this report from February 2010 that showed how the card was used for groceries, repairs to the family minivan and at a music equipment store. "I was as diligent as possible to ensure the party did not pay for items that were unrelated to party business," Rubio said in a written statement...

GOP presidential candidate Marco Rubio said Wednesday he'll release in the next few weeks all of the statements detailing his use of an American Express card he shared with the Republican Party of Florida. Rubio, a former speaker of the Florida House, had the party-issued card from February 2005 to November 2008. During his successful 2010 bid for U.S. Senate, news broke that Rubio had charged items such as grocery bills, plane tickets for his wife and repairs to the family minivan to the card. His spokesman, Alex Conant, said Wednesday that those expenses were for party business, and that...