Trump eyes ANOTHER pick to add to his list of potential vice presidential running mates as race heats up: Ex-president has mocked latest candidate Marco Rubio by calling him 'little'

Former President Donald Trump is expanding his list of potential vice presidential picks rather than narrowing it down, with the rival he once ridiculed as 'Little Marco' joining the line.

Trump and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio exchanged memorable digs on the campaign trial during the 2016 election – with Rubio mocking the size of Trump's hands and Trump insulting the 5 foot 9 Rubio for his stature.

Now, while leading President Joe Biden in the polls, Rubio has emerged as a potential Trump running mate – or at least as a person being floated on the expanding list.

It comes after a New York Times / Siena College poll had Trump leading President Joe Biden among Hispanic voters 46 to 40.

Rubio, whose parents were born in Cuba, serves on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and occupies a spot in the Republican Party's establishment wing, popping up on network Sunday shows and traveling to trouble spots. 

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio is being mentioned as a potential Donald Trump running mate. The two men clashed during the 2016 campaign

Trump sources has said the former president has indicated interest in a potential Hispanic running mate.

'It's pretty clear from Trump's orbit that Rubio is in play,' a veteran Florida operative told NBC News, which reported that Rubio is 'moving up the list.' 

Rubio is generally part of his party's internationalist wing and has supported U.S. aid to Ukraine. But he has also called for tying it to strengthening border protections, and spoke this month about prospects for a negotiated settlement with Russia.  

'So then the question becomes if in fact, there's going to be a negotiated settlement, who's going to have the leverage here? Is it going to be Putin or is it going to be Ukraine, and I want Ukraine to have the most amount of leverage possible when the time comes for those conversations to happen,' he said.

Rubio has also been floated in recent accounts of people who might fill key roles in a potential second term, in the case of Rubio national security posts.

The three-term Rubio generally operated as a Trump loyalist during Trump's term. He voted to acquit Trump during his first and second impeachments.

Former President Donald Trump is assembling a long list of potential running mates

Rubio insulted the size of Trump's hands during the 2016 campaign. Trump called him 'Little Marco'

'I voted to acquit former President Trump because I will not allow my anger over the criminal attack of January 6th nor the political intimidation from the left to lead me into supporting a dangerous constitutional precedent,' Rubio said in statement over the second impeachment, which came after January 6. 

'The election is over. A new President is in the White House and a new Congress has been sworn in. Let history, and if necessary the courts, judge the events of the past.'

But the two traded memorable attacks during the campaign, with Trump repeatedly diminishing him as 'Little Marco' in a race where he attached insults to most of his rivals. At one point, Rubio surfaced decades old attacks on the size of Trump's hands, which had been reported to infuriate him.

'He’s always calling me Little Marco. And I’ll admit he’s taller than me. He’s like 6’2, which is why I don’t understand why his hands are the size of someone who is 5’2,” Rubio said while campaigning in Virginia. And you know what they say about men with small hands? You can’t trust them.'

That left Trump to defend his manhood during a debate. 

'Look at those hands, are they small hands?' Trump asked while showing them. 'And, he referred to my hands – "if they’re small, something else must be small." I guarantee you there’s no problem. I guarantee,' Trump said.

There is a legal impediment that would need to be sorted: the Constitution bars electors from casting votes for a president and vice president who hail from the same state. Trump changed his residency from New York to lower tax Florida while in office. 

Republicans found their way around a similar problem in 2000 when Dick Cheney changed his residency from Texas to Wyoming and ran with George W. Bush.

'The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves,' according to the Constitution.