Bush: Trump has raised money for me

Now rivals for next year's Republican presidential nomination, Jeb Bush says Donald Trump once liked him well enough to raise money for him.

"He did a fundraiser for me,” Bush told The Daily Caller. “It might have been my re-election. I’m pretty sure it was my re-election, 2002. And in the past he said good things about my tenure as governor. But I’ve met him twice in my life.”

Trump, who has surged to second place behind Bush in some GOP polls, says he still likes Bush but questions his ability to win the nomination or a general election.

In his announcement speech last month, Trump said of Bush: "He's weak on immigration and he supports Common Core. How the hell can you vote for this guy?"

In a recent interview with CNN, Trump said Bush is "a nice person" and "I actually felt bad because I hit him very hard one day like two days ago, three days ago. And I said, 'why am I hitting him so hard?' "

For his part, Bush criticized Trump's criticism of some Mexican migrants, comments that have ruptured some of the billionaire's business relationships.

“His views are not reflective of the immigrant experience," Bush told The Daily Caller. "He's just wrong."

The former Florida governor added: “I don’t spend a lot of quality time going over the Trump message.”

Also from The Daily Caller:

"Records show Trump did donate $500 to Bush’s re-election campaign in 2002, which was the maximum donation allowed for state candidates in Florida at the time. News articles from 2002 don’t note a Trump fundraiser for Bush, though that hardly means one did not occur. Political fundraisers aren’t often covered by the press.

"A request for comment late Wednesday night was not immediately returned by the Trump campaign."