Florida Senator and Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio criticized Republican leadership on the Iran nuclear deal and other issues, stating they shouldn’t treat the deal like any other bill and wondering, “What’s the point having the majority then? We might as well have stayed in the minority” on Friday’s “America’s Newsroom” on the Fox News Channel.
Rubio said, “I don’t think that there’s even been a time in my lifetime where the political establishment in both parties have more out of touch with lives of every day people than today. There’s massive disconnect between Washington and rest of the country, it’s only grown wider. This deal is perfect example of it. An overwhelming majority of Americans, in poll after poll, have shown that they don’t support this deal. And yet you’ve got Democrats walking in lockstep, they treat this as some sort of partisan effort. Let’s rally around the president. Let’s defend his legacy issue. Who cares about the defense implications for our country? And quite frankly, you have the Republican leadership, in some cases, saying, let’s this like any other bill. This is not just any other bill. This is an issue about a radical Shia cleric, who is going to come in possession of nuclear weapons, at some point in our lifetime. And we should be doing everything we can. Fine, we don’t have votes, for that. … I also support the argument that’s being made, that we don’t have the entire deal, that this clock has not begun to run. And we should be stating that unequivocally right now. We should be searching for every opportunity to impose additional sanctions. We should be creative about doing everything possible. If there is ever an issue, in which we would stop everything to focus on something like a laser, it would be this. And instead I get the sense that its like, let’s have a couple votes, and then let’s move on to the next issue. This thing is done with. This is too important for that.”
He added, “we’re going to everything we can in order to stop it. We’re going to find — we’re going to be creative about it. We’re going to continue to bring this issue up. We’re going to do everything we can to derail it. I mean, if you’re ever going to fall on the sword over an issue, something that threatens the security of the United States, and future of the world, I think that merits that attention, but it goes back to this extraordinary disconnect, that’s only grown worse. I don’t know what it is, but after someone’s been there for a long time, they become insulated from what life is like for every day people, what life is like across this country. And the results are bearing out. Quite frankly, it’s one the reasons why I chose not to run for re-election to the Senate, after just four-and-a-half of 1/2 years, and run for president. Because I’ve realized, that only way we’re going change this, is to have someone in the White House who is serious about these sort of things.”
Rubio concluded, “on every issue they say there’s nothing we can do, because there’s a procedural bill, a procedural vote that’s blocking it, or we don’t have enough votes or –. What’s the point having the majority then? We might as well have stayed in the minority, and at least we could just criticize and really say there’s nothing we can do. It seems like, apparently, these guys control the world no matter what the numbers are in Congress.” And that Democrats know the deal is bad, but are “afraid of the radical, left-wing base of their own party” and “being attacked by the president.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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