NOTICIAS

Washington, D.C. – Earlier today, U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) joined several of his Senate Republican colleagues at a press conference regarding the catastrophic implications of automatic defense cuts enacted in The Budget Control Act. Rubio delivered the following remarks:

“I think much of it has been covered and I know you’re anxious to get to your questions and to Lindsey Graham, so I’ll be to the point. The good news is that I can’t find anyone around here who actually thinks this is a good idea. Everybody agrees that this would be catastrophic. The bad news is that we can’t find enough people around here who want to do anything about it right away.

“This is not something to play with. You don’t play a game of chicken with our national defense, especially when it comes to the United States. The military power of the United States has made the world a better and safer place. History has proven that the stronger the U.S. military is, the more peaceful the world becomes. 

“One of the reasons why some of our more crazy adversaries around the planet measure themselves before they do things is they realize what it would mean in terms of our response. If we undermine that, if we weaken that, we are encouraging bad actors all across the world to think about doing things they wouldn’t otherwise think about doing. 

“Our national defense has implications not just for Americans, but for the world. We’re not the Netherlands. We’re not Switzerland. We’re not some small country. We have significant global obligations that have implications for people beyond our borders. But in our own borders, the federal government has a direct and distinct obligation to provide for the national security of our people. It is our number one obligation as a federal government: to protect our country. And to do this sort of measure, to even consider it is, I think is ridiculous. 

“The good news, as I said, is that no one around here thinks this is a good idea or that it’s sustainable, but the bad news is there seems to be no sense of urgency to address it beyond some of the people you see on the stage here today. I hope we’ll address this issue quickly. There are a lot of other things we can debate about.  There are a lot of other issues we can disagree on.  There are plenty of other issues we can have political wrangling over.  Our national security should not be one of them.”

Watch Senator Rubio deliver today’s remarks here. For television stations interested in airing today’s response, a broadcast quality video is also available here.