Jeb Bush is urging the "nervous Nellies" among his donors to "chill out" about his struggling campaign.
During a conference call on Wednesday, of which
NBC News reports it obtained an audio recording, the former Florida governor delivered an upbeat message about his retooled "Jeb Can Fix It" campaign.
"All the nervous Nellies on the call, chill out," Bush urged, NBC News reports. "We're going to do better, I promise you. And this is going to be a fun campaign."
He also declared of the early voting state primary Feb. 9: "I'm going to win New Hampshire, I just feel it."
"I know in my heart that we're on the right track," he says, NBC News reports.
"All of the disparagement of the campaign . . . makes people discomforted," he concedes, aiming a jibe at the political media.
"If you follow all that stuff, my suggestion is don't follow it, stop reading Politico," he said. "Stop reading the clips. It doesn't matter. A week from now they're going to be writing about something else."
Bush also assured supporters he was going to "grind" it out for his next test: the Nov. 10 GOP debate hosted by Fox Business Network.
"If you just grind and break through it, you get to the place where you want to be," he said of his strategy. "You show your heart, you show your courage, you show your determination. You don't get angry when people ask really amazing questions, like, are you getting out of the race next week?"
Bush's reference was to an interview with
ABC's Jon Karl, who asked if he planned to drop out of the presidential primary before the Iowa caucuses.
"If there was a day and time where I would have shouted an expletive . . . " Bush said. "But I do this now, in a way that shows that I can walk through hot coals. This is not nearly the hardest thing that the president's going to do, running for president pales in comparison to being president."
Bush is stuck approximately in the middle of the GOP primary pack, with a national polling average of 5.8 percent, according to
Real Clear Politics.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.