Carson campaign says it outraised Cruz

Ted Cruz sure has been busy on the campaign trail.

Trump has been increasingly proactive in sparring with Cruz in recent public meetings, questioning his faith and referring to his father’s Cuban immigration. “He was totally opposed to it, and didn’t go there to vote no. Then what’s it matter that you’re opposed to it?”

U.S. Senator Marco Rubio made a campaign stop in Pella Wednesday morning as part of a statewide bus tour. He said Washington is “completely broken” and “more than half the things that happen in Washington are just for show or for talk”.

But it is risky to be seen as having to win a particular state a month before the voting, he said.

Carson, buoyed by his appeal to evangelicals and as an outsider candidate, surged to the top of Iowa polls in October.

While the business mogul remains dominant across nationwide polls, he is facing a stiff challenge from Cruz in Iowa.

As first reported in the Des Moines Register, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush’s campaign is shifting its resources, scaling back advertising campaigns in early primary states like Iowa and shifting resources to staffing on the ground to work on boosting voter turnout. That’s more than any of the other senators running for president.

Since the start of the fourth quarter, Cruz has surged in the polls, particularly in Iowa, where he is now the poll leader, and his fundraising numbers mirror that bounce.

“We’re going to spend a lot of money over the next 4 weeks and we’re going to just we just don’t want to take any chances, we’re too close”, said Trump.

A good organization is important in Iowa because caucuses take more effort than a primary, requiring voters to show up at a fixed time on a winter night.

But political analysts say Cruz could have additional opponents in the fight for the religious vote, even from Trump. Retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and former Pennsylvania Sen.

Cruz’s fundraising quarter would cap a strong finish to a year that ends with him challenging Trump for the lead in the GOP race. Chris Christie of New Jersey and John Kasich of Ohio. Records indicate that at least eight times since May-and six times since September-that Rubio has missed votes on the Senate floor on the same day the Senate Intelligence Committee held meetings.

Rubio, however, landed a major endorsement from South Carolina Senator Trey Gowdy.