Jacob Ogles
In his first remarks before his new agency, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told State Department employees the agency must always put America first.
“In our republic, the voters decide the course of our nation, both domestically and abroad, and they have elected Donald J Trump as our President — when it comes to foreign policy on a very clear mission,” Rubio said in a speech to employees.
“And that mission is to ensure that our foreign policy is centered on one thing, and that is the advancement of our national interest, which they have clearly defined through his campaign, as anything that makes us stronger or safer or more prosperous.”
The Senate unanimously confirmed Rubio as the nation’s new Secretary of State on Monday, hours after Trump’s inauguration. Vice President JD Vance ceremoniously swore in the former U.S. Senator as the Cabinet member on Tuesday morning, where Rubio gave a similar summation of Trump’s agenda.
When it came to the State Department employees, he did strike a decisively more nurturing tone, stressing the importance of maintaining a healthy home life even with work that requires travel overseas.
He offered high praise to the professionals working at the State Department, including those working in areas of the world “more tenuous and dangerous” than the institutions of Washington. He also made special note of foreign nationals working as employed staff at embassies around the globe.
“This is an extraordinary honor and a privilege to serve in this role,” Rubio said, “to be here, frankly, to oversee the greatest, the most effective, the most talented, the most experienced diplomatic corps in the history of the world resides in this building.”
Of note, Rubio as a member of the Senate Intelligence and Foreign Relations Committees often had tense interactions with Democratic Secretaries of State, including predecessor Antony Blinken, who expressed worry to The Associated Press about how the agency will continue its work under Trump.
For his part, Rubio said he will come into the job aware he plays a different role as the nation’s top diplomat than he did as Florida’s senior Senator.
“I’ve interacted with many of you, both in my travels abroad and in our daily functions,” Rubio said. “My job now is different, and our job, in some ways, will be different.”
Of note, leaders in the State Department at the event offered welcoming words and praised Rubio’s experience in foreign policy. A speaker made special note of Rubio’s own visit to Colombia in 2019, when Rubio visited the Simon Bolivar Bridge on the border with Venezuela and urged soldiers to allow humanitarian aid to reach people there.
Rubio made that trip with U.S. Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart, a Hialeah Republican who once served with the now-Secretary of State in the Florida Legislature. Rubio gave the dean of Florida’s congressional delegation a special shoutout in his speech recalling their personal history.
Rubio also noted that U.S. Rep. Lois Frankel, a West Palm Beach Democrat who also served in Florida’s Legislature, attended the speech, as did U.S. Rep. Brian Mast, a Stuart Republican now chairing the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Rubio jokingly urged the lawmakers to support coming appropriations requests, but also promised a partnership between the agency and Congress.
Above all, he said he wanted the State Department to be forward-looking and central to decision-making overseas.
“I have watched from the congressional side from time to time, administrations in both parties in which sometimes the Department of State has been sort of relegated to a secondary role,” Rubio said, “because some other agency can move faster or seems to be bolder or more creative. It’s not your fault, but we’re going to change that. We want to be at the centerpiece. We want to be at the core of how we formulate foreign policy, because we’re going to have the best ideas of any agency, and because we’re going to execute it better and faster and more effectively than any other agency in our government.”
