(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .



Little Marco: Defeated by Ambition & Margaritas [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2025-05-22

When the people who know you and once respected you find you abhorrently disgusting, it is time to take a long look at yourself. To use Trump’s nickname for you, “Little Marco, who do you see when you look in the mirror?” How could Trump know that his appellation would perfectly capture your morality? While some will disagree in their assessment, 99 of your Senate colleagues voted for you as Secretary of State—unanimous—because you earned their respect over fourteen years in the Senate. In that time, you knew the strategic value of foreign assistance, including USAID, valued our allies, opposed dictators like Putin, supported Ukraine, and criticized human rights abuses.

When the people who once knew you, worked alongside you, and respected you now find you abhorrently disgusting, it is time to take a long, hard look at yourself. To borrow Trump’s demeaning nickname, “Little Marco,” who do you see when you look in the mirror? How could he have known how perfectly that name would one day capture the shrinking integrity of your moral compass?

While some might disagree with this harsh assessment, the fact remains: 99 of your Senate colleagues once voted to confirm you as Secretary of State. Unanimously. You had earned their respect after fourteen years in the Senate. You understood the strategic value of foreign assistance—including USAID—respected our allies, opposed dictators like Putin, supported Ukraine, and stood up for human rights.

Yet in just four months, you have unraveled all of that. You have become corrupted beyond recognition—a mini-Trump in both posture and principle.

Did you listen as your Senate colleagues addressed you during the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on May 20, 2025? It seems not. You offered only deflection and indignation—puffed up on ambition, dreaming that this performance of Secretary of State would secure your political future. But the Senate expected a statesman. Instead, they got an opportunist, an embarrassing political hack.

Their remarks, many of them, were pointed and deliberate—mini essays grading your performance. You earned an “F.” Senator Jacky Rosen (D-NV) said, “I wonder if you’re proud of yourself in this moment, when you go home to your family. I don’t recognize [you].” (Source: thehill.com/...)

Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) detailed your ongoing lawlessness. Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) dismantled your bizarre justification for a U.S. white Afrikaner refugee program—an initiative Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) rightfully called “global apartheid.” Van Hollen also took you to task for revoking student visas as you did with Rumeysa Öztürk saying, “You know as well as I do this isn't about national security. It’s about punishing free speech.” (Source: https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/will-continue-stripping-student-visas-marco-rubio-during-heated-senate-hearing-8467329) He also cited your failure to comply with a Supreme Court ruling to facilitate the return of Kilmar Armando Ábrego García. Your reply? “We deported gang members …including the one you had a margarita with.” (Source: https://www.npr.org/2025/05/20/nx-s1-5404679/marco-rubio-senate-foreign-affairs) A juvenile, dishonest jab. The Van Hollen- Ábrego García-margarita photo was photoshopped, and you knew it—meaning you knowingly lied under oath. Childish. Dishonorable.

And there’s more.

The Cato Institute confirmed that over fifty Venezuelans deported to El Salvador on March 15, 2025, had entered the U.S. legally and violated no immigration laws. (Source: https://www.cato.org/blog/50-venezuelans-imprisoned-el-salvador-came-us-legally-never-violated-immigration-law) Yet you framed them as criminals, devoid of due process, to justify your use of the Alien Enemies Act.

On March 28, 2025, you said in a press conference, “We have reason to believe that they were actually being pushed towards the United States in large numbers by the regime in Venezuela.” (Source:https://www.state.gov/secretary-of-state-marco-rubio-remarks-to-the-press-3/) Based on what? Saying it doesn’t make it true.

An April 7, 2025, National Intelligence Council memorandum, made public on May 8, 2025, concluded that “the Maduro regime probably does not have a policy of cooperating with TDA [Tren de Aragua]” and is not directing their movement to the U.S. The memo explicitly stated that no evidence had been found of coordination or funding between Maduro’s regime and the gang. (Source: https://www.npr.org/2025/05/06/nx-s1-5388392/u-s-intelligence-memo-says-venezuelan-government-does-not-control-tren-de-aragua-gang) Despite this, you chose to rely on an April 20 tweet from FBI Director Kash Patel, which suggested vague connections but never claimed evidence of an invasion—an essential condition for invoking the Alien Enemies Act. (Source: https://x.com/FBIDirectorKash/status/1914030115262239021)

And when the memo didn’t fit the Trump administration’s narrative, Tulsi Gabbard, now Director of National Intelligence, fired the authors—Mike Collins, the acting chair of the National Intelligence Council (NIC), and Maria Langan-Riekhof, his deputy. According to the New York Times, Joe Kent, Gabbard’s chief of staff, emailed colleagues urging them to rewrite the memo “so this document is not used against the DNI or POTUS.” (Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/20/us/politics/gabbard-intelligence-venezuelans-tren-de-aragua-trump.html) When rewriting failed, they fired the messengers. Craven!

Still, you doubled down. On May 18, in an interview on “Face the Nation,” you claimed the intelligence memo was wrong, siding instead with the FBI’s assessment—which, again, never supported your claims of an invasion.

Let’s be clear: Neither the NIC nor the FBI provided evidence that would justify invoking the Alien Enemies Act. Criminal activity, however serious, is not a military invasion.

Even former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer believes it is “quite possible” that you, Kristi Noem, and Attorney General Pam Bondi could be held in criminal contempt for defying court orders in the Ábrego García case. (Source: https://abovethelaw.com/2025/04/former-justice-breyer-thinks-marco-rubio-and-pam-bondi-can-be-held-in-criminal-contempt-for-defying-court-orders/)

And on May 1, 2025, Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. of the Southern District of Texas—a Trump appointee—issued a permanent injunction blocking the use of the Alien Enemies Act to detain or deport Venezuelans in southeastern Texas. He ruled that gang activity does not meet the legal definitions of “invasion” or “predatory incursion” required under the statute. (Source: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.txsd.2000771/gov.uscourts.txsd.2000771.58.0_1.pdf)

If you think you are fooling the public, then you are the fool.

In January 2025, based on a Marquette University Law School poll, your net favorability was +12% (43% favorable, 31% unfavorable). By May, it had plummeted to -4% (34% favorable, 38% unfavorable)—a drop of 16 points in four months. You are now underwater. And yet you still seem to believe you have a political future. (Source: https://law.marquette.edu/poll/)

Marco, you weren’t defeated by your enemies. Your ambition, your arrogance, and your cynical thirst for power defeated you. The truth didn’t break you. You walked away from it. The Senate confirmed you in good faith. Your betrayal of that trust—of American values, the rule of law, and the people who once respected you—will be your legacy. You may have chased power, but all you caught were margaritas and disgrace.

Day 123: days left to January 20, 2029: 1,339 days

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/5/22/2323741/-Little-Marco-Defeated-by-Ambition-Margaritas?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web

Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/