With just a day to go before Florida’s Republican presidential primary and the top two candidates bitterly sniping at one another, South Florida resident Kathy Gingrich Lubbers pushed back against what is being aired against her father.
“When you have $15 million slamming up against your father, saying things that are not accurate and are hurtful and painful, that’s not helpful,” Newt Gingrich’s daughter told NBC Miami. “And it’s especially interesting that Governor Romney is not putting any money positively behind what he did as governor, for some very serious reasons.”
Gingrich Lubbers criticized Mitt Romney for increasing fines on gun owners and for Massachusetts lagging in job creation when he was governor of the state.
Asked about being outspent 5 to 1, the Key Biscayne resident replied, “If you look at the long game, which is what we’re doing, anybody working on our side of the table as a republican is going to be outspent by President Obama. So it’s good training, is the way I look at it.”
She added that Gingrich was outspent in South Carolina, but “they voted their hearts and it worked out well for us.”
Gingrich is behind by 10 points or more in the latest Florida polls.
Gingrich Lubbers said the Florida primary “may or may not go as well as it did in South Carolina, clearly.”
Local
But she said “we have a good message,” and cited her father’s accomplishments as House speaker, highlighting how he cut taxes, cut spending, and balanced the budget.
She also emphasized Gingrich’s more moderate position on immigration.
“My father has the best stance on immigration in regards to being heartfelt, and cognizant of the fact that we have millions of people here that have been here for a long time, and we’re not sending grandmothers and grandfathers home. There’s an opportunity for them to be here legally … if they meet certain qualifications,” she said. “There are opportunities that work and that we can make real, for the people that live here, especially in South Florida, of whom I’m fond of.”
