A New American Century

In April of 2015, United States Senator Marco Rubio launched what many thought would be a successful run for the presidency. A child of Cuban immigrants, the son of a bartender and a housekeeper, he was the poster boy for the future of the Republican Party. Young, charismatic, and a Hispanic-American with an inspiring success story to boot, many pundits had him not only winning the Republican nomination, but going on to soundly defeat Hillary Clinton in 2016.

Enter Donald Trump.

Trump's run turned the entire presidential campaign upside down. What was once considered the future of the GOP floundered hard in the primaries, only managing to win two contests (Puerto Rico and Minnesota). After losing his own home state of Florida in March, Marco Rubio officially suspended his campaign, while Donald Trump went and pulled off the unthinkable, upsetting Hillary Clinton in November to claim the presidency.

What if Trump had never run for the Presidency, instead staying on the sidelines as a donor to whomever the Republican Party selected as its nominee? What if the match up in the primaries was between Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio? What would happen if we had seen Marco Rubio claim the Republican nomination? Let's find out.

Summary of Changes

 * First and foremost: Donald Trump does not seek the Republican nomination at the behest of his wife, opting to become a donor and supporter of whomever win the nomination.
 * The contest in the primaries becomes a battle between Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio.
 * The Democratic Party is more splintered between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton, with the latter having a more pronounced rise to stardom, akin to the of Barack Obama in 2008
 * While Sanders still does not win, he manages to force a brokered convention, with Hillary winning by a very narrow margin. While Sanders still endorses Clinton, he does very little to campaign for her.
 * The Republican Party is more united than OTL. All types of party officials, such as Senators, Congressmen, Governors, former federal officials, former Cabinet members, and even prominent celebrities, come out in full force for the Rubio campaign.
 * The 2016 Governor, House, and Senate races are slightly different from OTL.
 * In the Senate, Republicans still are not able to hold onto Illinois (Mark Kirk), but they are narrowly able to hold on to New Hampshire, and gain a seat in Nevada (Joe Heck), Harry Reid's old seat. They do, however, narrowly lose Missouri, where Jason Kander upsets Roy Blunt, putting the Senate at 53-47 for Republicans.
 * In the House, Republicans manage to win the following races that they lost OTL: NH-1, NH-2, MN-1, MN-8, NV-3, CA-7, and NJ-5, giving Republicans a net gain of one seat rather than a net loss of 6
 * In the Governor's races, the only two races to change are North Carolina and Montana. Rubio is able to effectively campaign for Greg Gianforte in Montana enough for him to win by a total of just 72,000 votes, while Pat McCrory in North Carolina wins by the skin of his teeth at just 5000 votes. After an initial recount, followed by a hand recount, McCrory is certified the winner by just 1350 votes.

Pages

 * Marco Rubio
 * Hillary Clinton
 * Bernie Sanders
 * Nikki Haley
 * Tim Kaine
 * United States presidential election, 2016
 * United States Senate elections, 2016
 * Cabinet of Marco Rubio
 * Marco Rubio presidential campaign, 2016