From Trump opponent to Trump loyalist: The evolution of Marco Rubio
Consider This from NPR
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4.2 • 6.2K Ratings
🗓️ 17 November 2024
⏱️ 14 minutes
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Summary
He's a veteran politician who served on the foreign relations and intelligence committees for over a decade, and he's been a loyal Trump backer throughout this year's campaign.
But when you look back at Marco Rubio during his 2016 presidential campaign, there's a striking contrast.
When he ran against Trump in 2016, Rubio called him a con artist, and described his style of leadership as dangerous. Now, he's going to work for him.
Marco Rubio's political evolution is indicative of how the Republican Party has remade itself around Donald Trump, and it gives some clues about how he may operate as the nation's top diplomat.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | When compared to some of President-elect Trump's other cabinet picks, |
| 0:03.2 | Senator Marco Rubio for Secretary of State is pretty conventional. |
| 0:06.8 | He's a veteran politician who served on foreign relations and intelligence committees for over a decade, |
| 0:12.4 | and he's been a loyal Trump backer throughout this year's campaign. |
| 0:16.4 | Take this moment from earlier this month, not long after Trump attacked former congresswoman Liz |
| 0:21.3 | Cheney in graphic terms. She's a radical war hawk. Let's put her with a rifle standing there |
| 0:27.9 | with nine barrel shooting at her, okay? Let's see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are |
| 0:33.0 | trained on her face. Rubio was asked about that moment by Margaret Brennan on CBS's Face the Nation. |
| 0:38.3 | Isn't it possible to make the case without using rhetoric like that? |
| 0:43.3 | But Donald Trump doesn't talk like someone who's been in Washington for 30 years. |
| 0:47.3 | Training guns on her face? |
| 0:49.3 | No, but that's not what he said. |
| 0:51.3 | Margot, you guys know that. Come on. |
| 0:52.3 | Everybody knows exactly what he was saying. They went back and forth. |
| 0:55.0 | Rubio said this. |
| 0:56.0 | It is a point that has been made by people in both parties for decades, and that is, you're all for war, |
| 1:01.0 | and it's easy to be for war when you're in some fancy building and you're safe and sound in Washington, |
| 1:06.0 | D.C. Let's see how much you are for war when you yourself get deployed into combat. |
| 1:12.5 | That's the point that he was making. |
| 1:17.3 | That he uses language that maybe is not what we typically hear from someone that works out a think tank. |
| 1:18.1 | Oh, fine. |
| 1:19.2 | But I think it's true. In 2024, this is a pretty run-of-the-mill TV appearance from a Republican. |
... |
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