Trump, Cruz, Rubio barnstorm Arkansas as Clinton wins big in South Carolina

The three top contenders for the GOP Presidential nomination – Donald Trump, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio – held big rallies in Northwest and central Arkansas just three days before the SEC primary on Tuesday.

Cruz and Rubio will continue their campaigning on Sunday and Monday, while South Carolina’s big Democratic winner, former First Lady Hillary Clinton, comes back to Arkansas for a pre-election rally Sunday night.

Trump kicked off the early campaign activities on Saturday with a hangar rally at the Bentonville airport. Nearly 8,000 supporters crowded into the building to get a glimpse of the billionaire frontrunner who gave the crowd plenty of red meat rhetoric.

“I thought Cruz was a liar, but Rubio is worse,” said Trump, diving into his recently escalated harsh words for Rubio, who many pundits feel got under Trump’s skin in a Thursday night debate.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who recently suspended his presidential campaign and has subsequently endorsed Trump, campaigned with him at the event.

Trump wrapped up the event saying, “I would love to win Arkansas – special place, many friends. I don’t want your money, I don’t need your money. I don’t want it. I want you to go out and vote on Tuesday.”

Rubio and Cruz rallied with supporters in the evening. Rubio campaigned before several thousand at the Global Outreach Center of Immanuel Baptist Church in Rogers. After two days of digs at Donald Trump on the campaign trail, Rubio lit into the real estate mogul again.

“He says he’s some sort of business guru. Really? How come you went bankrupt four times?” Rubio asked the supportive crowd.

On Saturday, Rubio released five years of partial tax returns showing his income and taxes paid. He challenged Trump to do the same. Rubio also hit Trump hard on a variety of issues, including legal challenges that have become more public surrounding Trump University, an online course that Trump once promoted. Several people have stepped forward and complained that the courses, meant to teach Trump’s real estate secrets, were bogus.

“We are not going to let the party of Lincoln and the party of Reagan be taken over by a scam artist,” Rubio said to the Rogers crowd.

Sen. Ted Cruz spoke to a packed crowd of about 1,500 in the Little Rock Doubletree Hotel. Conservative radio and television host Glenn Beck warmed up the crowd for about 30 minutes before Cruz hit the stage.

Fighting a cold, Cruz still hit his standard stump speech highlights, emphasizing religious freedom, restrictive government, and an undoing of the Obama administration’s executive actions. He also threw barbs at Rubio and Trump, saying of Trump: “It’s easy to talk about wanting to make America great again. You can even print it on a baseball cap.”

Like Rubio, Cruz followed through with a campaign promise in releasing more of his tax returns, including the summary pages of the last four years. He has released nine years worth of tax records overall. Cruz said he would be willing to release more information regarding the returns if Trump and the other Presidential candidates released more information.

Cruz campaigns Sunday morning in Northwest Arkansas and Rubio will be at the University of Central Arkansas on Monday afternoon with Gov. Asa Hutchinson, who campaigned with him on Saturday night.

On Sunday night, Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton will campaign in Pine Bluff in an early evening rally. Clinton won in a landslide in South Carolina on Saturday over Bernie Sanders. The final vote tally was 73.5% for Clinton to 26% to Sanders. In a victory speech to reporters, Clinton said, “Tomorrow, this campaign goes national.”

But she’s already preparing a narrative to take on the current GOP frontrunner, Trump.

“Despite what you hear, we don’t need to make America great again. America has never stopped being great,” Clinton also said on Saturday night. “But we do need to make America whole again. Instead of building walls, we need to be tearing down barriers.”

Editor’s note: KATV’s Stacey Spivey and Jordan Bontke contributed to this report.