Jeb Bush wants people to stop looking at polls and 'take a chill pill'

published 12 May 2015

He still hasn’t officially announced a presidential bid, but Jeb Bush has some choice words for those who think polls show his popularity among Republicans is slipping.

"The polls are totally irrelevant," Bush told Fox News' Megyn Kelly on Monday. "I'm not a candidate yet. So...everybody needs to take a chill pill on the polls until it gets closer." Over the course of a 22-minute interview, Bush also discussed immigration reform and Common Core, saying the education standards that are controversial among conservatives were very successful in Florida, where he served as governor from 1997 to 2007. “I respect people having a view," he said. "But the simple fact is, we need higher standards. They need to be state driven. The federal government should play no part in this either, either in the creation of standards, content, or curriculum."

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

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