NYT (“Trump Expected to Name Marco Rubio as Secretary of State“):
President-elect Donald J. Trump is expected to name Senator Marco Rubio of Florida as his secretary of state, three people familiar with his thinking said on Monday, as Mr. Trump moves rapidly to fill out his foreign policy and national security team.
Mr. Trump could still change his mind at the last minute, the people said, but appeared to have settled on Mr. Rubio, whom he also considered when choosing his running mate this year.
Mr. Rubio was elected to the Senate in 2010, and has staked out a position as a foreign policy hawk, taking hard lines on China, Iran, Venezuela and Cuba in particular.
He initially found himself at odds with those Republicans who were more skeptical about interventions abroad, but he has also echoed Mr. Trump more recently on issues like Russia’s war against Ukraine, saying that the conflict has reached a stalemate and “needs to be brought to a conclusion.”
Despite speaking in hard-line terms about Russia in the past, Mr. Rubio would likely go along with Mr. Trump’s expected plans to press Ukraine to find a way to come to a settlement with Russia and remain outside of NATO. It is unclear whether the leaders of Ukraine or Russia would be prepared to enter into talks at Mr. Trump’s urging.
Mr. Rubio has been among the most outspoken senators on the need for the United States to be more aggressive on China. He has adopted positions that later became more mainstream in both parties. For example, while serving in Congress during the first Trump administration, he began advocating industrial policy meant to help the United States better compete with China’s state-directed economy.
Mr. Rubio also served as a co-chairman of the bipartisan Congressional-Executive Commission on China, which has aimed to craft aggressive policy on China, especially in trying to address human rights abuses there. In 2020, Mr. Rubio sponsored a bill that tried to prevent the import of Chinese goods made with the use of forced labor by China’s ethnic Uyghur minority. President Biden signed it into law the next year.
While I certainly didn’t have “Little Marco” Rubio, who was long at odds with Trump before becoming a leading sycophant, on my radar screen for the post, he’s well qualified—certainly more so than Rex Tillerson or Mike Pompeo, who served in the post in the first administration. He’s been in the Senate for fourteen years and serves on both the Foreign Relations and Intelligence Committees; he’s the ranking Republican on the latter.
Multiple reputable sources are reporting that Rubio is the selection. He’ll easily be confirmed by his colleagues.
The notion that the Secretary of State sets his own policy agenda is rather silly. Of course President Trump will be the ultimate decider. But Rubio’s instincts are perfectly reasonable and, indeed, align with the Biden administration’s policy with regard to key adversaries. The degree to which Trump will actually listen to him remains to be seen.
In terms of domestic politics, Rubio was just re-elected in 2022. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis would appoint a replacement, who would presumably have a leg up in a 2026 special election to serve the final two years of the term. There is plenty of speculation as to who DeSantis might appoint. Regardless, the seat will remain in Republican hands at least through he midterms.
