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This GIF of Trump mocking Rubio with a water bottle sums up the state of the 2016 campaign

Libby Nelson
Libby Nelson was Vox’s editorial director, politics and policy, leading coverage of how government action and inaction shape American life. Libby has more than a decade of policy journalism experience, including at Inside Higher Ed and Politico. She joined Vox in 2014.

The afternoon that could, eventually, be remembered as the moment when the Republican race went completely off the rails started with Marco Rubio tearing into Donald Trump over, among other things, grammatical errors in Trump’s tweets.

And then it got weirder, as Trump, at a Texas rally, responded by mocking Rubio guzzling water during his response to the State of the Union address in 2012:

trump_use.0.gif

And mocking Rubio’s ears:

And promising to remove libel protections for American journalists:

Oh, and sometime in there, Trump won Chris Christie’s endorsement.

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