In the 48 hours after Bush made his announcement, Bush was outflanked by Sen. Marco Rubio on the Cuba debate. Then Sen. Rand Paul beat Bush to the punch on one of the fundamentals of an online campaign: controlling the space atop Google search results for his name. Paul’s RandPAC bought ad space tied to searches for Bush and used the prime real estate to poke the former governor’s politics.
“I think this is one of the biggest challenges, the fact he hasn’t run for office since 2002,” said Craig Stevens, a former George W. Bush administration spokesman. “That’s why I wouldn’t have been surprised if he didn’t decide to run, because it’s such a different game.”
“There’s almost nothing in common between the campaign environment of 12 years ago and the campaign environment today. So much has changed. A new entrant like this is going to have to adjust to that,” added Kurt Luidhardt, vice president and co-founder of the Prosper Group, a GOP digital media firm with ties to two other potential 2016 candidates, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Indiana Gov. Mike Pence.
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