Florida Sen. Marco Rubio has a potential campaign manager in his sights should he decide to run for president next year.
According to
The Washington Post, the Republican has recruited Rich Beeson — a political operative who worked in a senior role on Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential campaign — to serve on his expected campaign for the White House.
The Post cites anonymous Republican sources; neither Rubio or Beeson would comment on the story.
Beeson is one of several former Romney staffers Rubio has been courting. That list
includes Jim Merrill, who spearheaded Romney's 2008 and 2012 primary campaigns in New Hampshire and who is currently serving as a senior adviser on Rubio's political action committee.
Rubio is also
pursuing Spencer Zwick, who was Romney's top fundraiser in the 2012 campaign. Zwick told the Post he has not yet aligned himself with any potential candidate for the 2016 election.
"Senator Rubio is starting to build a campaign team and he has a message that resonates," Zwick told the Post. "I like him a lot and I look forward to getting to know him more in the coming weeks."
No one on Rubio's team has confirmed the 43-year-old senator, who took office in 2011, will run for president next year. But he is expected to announce his decision in the coming weeks — and that decision looks to be a yes, according to several people.
"I assume he's running," Republican fundraiser Wayne Berman told the Associated Press last week. "He will help the party turn the page, politically, to the next generation."
No major candidate for either party has officially entered the presidential race, but the GOP's field of potential candidates is deep. Wisconsin Gov.
Scott Walker currently leads in several polls, although close behind him is former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.
Rubio is lagging behind Walker, Bush, and several others.
During an Iowa book signing last month,
Rubio touted his foreign policy credentials as he chatted with Iowans for nearly 90 minutes.
"Few, if any, have spent the time on [foreign policy] that I have," Rubio said, referring to his potential GOP opponents for the White House.
Rubio also called the foreign policy under President Barack Obama a "disaster," and said former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton — the probable Democratic candidate for president — "was part of being its chief architect."
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