Above all else, the 2016 race has been weird. The Republican front-runner — a former reality star who once proposed the biggest tax hike in U.S. history — just called his chief rival a “pussy” for opposing military torture. Meanwhile, a septuagenarian socialist from Vermont is outperforming America’s second female secretary of State with young women in New Hampshire by nearly 80 points.
Thus, it should come as no surprise that the final hours of campaigning in the Granite State have produced all manner of surreality. Here’s a quick roundup of all the strange happenings that are keeping the New Hampshire primary weird:
Marco Rubio is being assailed by robots everywhere he goes.
Marco Rubio’s handlers forgot to update his operating system before Saturday night’s debate, causing Florida’s first cyborg senator to glitch out on national television, and then to do so again, 48 hours later, at a New Hampshire town hall.
Now, no matter where Rubio travels in the Granite State, a pack of cardboard robo-buddies is never far behind.
Some of Rubio’s flesh-and-blood supporters don’t seem to be appreciating the company.
Protesters tried to perform an exorcism on Ted Cruz.
Ted Cruz was just beginning his stump speech Monday when two young men burst into the Tuckaway Tavern carrying mirrors and wooden crosses.
“Ted Cruz look in the mirror and let the evil spirit depart!” one of the men shouted, according to the Dallas Morning News. “He’s possessed by a demon!”
Over the boos of the senator’s supporters, the man continued: “The demon has to leave. That’s why the body is so disgusting to look at! Evil body! Evil spirit. Look yourself in the mirror!” he shouted.
After fleeing the tavern, the would-be exorcists elaborated on Cruz’s demonic condition.
“He’s very hard to be in the same room with. We had to exorcise some sort of disgusting evil spirit,” one man said, between bouts of fake retching. “There’s a reason that the body is so haggard and disgusting, and the face, and it’s all so weathered and gross and hard to look at.”
While few others seem to recognize that Cruz has become Satan’s plaything, a significant number of Americans believe he’s fallen under the sway of the Freemasons.
Trump called Hillary Clinton straight-up “evil.”
The Donald seems to think his former wedding guest is in need of an exorcism. Asked by MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski to describe Hillary Clinton in one word, Trump managed to simultaneously fail the assignment and be maximally mean-spirited.
“In a certain way, evil,” the GOP front-runner replied.
For some totally non-sexist reason, Trump was far kinder in his one-word assessment of Clinton’s husband, calling the 42nd president “intelligent.”
People keep fainting at Bernie Sanders rallies.
On Monday night, for at least the second time in seven days, someone passed out onstage at a Bernie Sanders rally. According to Gawker, the political revolution almost suffered its first casualty, as the Sanders supporter “nearly missed smashing her head directly into the podium.” Maybe Lloyd Blankfein was right.
Vermin Supreme sang “Born to Run” to Chris Christie’s campaign bus.
Chris Christie has a famous, unrequited appreciation for Bruce Springsteen. And so the race’s only true “outsider candidate,” Vermin Supreme, treated the New Jersey governor to an endless off-key rendition of one of the Boss’s greatest hits.
Somehow, Christie failed to appreciate the gesture.
Just a few hours left before the circus leaves town.
