{"id":650115,"date":"2026-05-18T10:10:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-18T10:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/650115\/"},"modified":"2026-05-18T10:10:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-18T10:10:12","slug":"how-marco-rubio-morphed-his-way-into-trumps-inner-circle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/650115\/","title":{"rendered":"How Marco Rubio morphed his way into Trump\u2019s inner circle"},"content":{"rendered":"

As a United States senator from Florida, Marco Rubio was a high-profile \u201cneocon\u201d \u2013 a hawk on China and Russia, a strong supporter of Taiwan, Ukraine, and NATO, and an advocate for free trade and human rights.<\/p>\n

Today, not so much \u2013 at least on those issues. As both secretary of State and acting national security adviser, Secretary Rubio is fully on board with President Donald Trump\u2019s approach to foreign policy: more \u201cArt of the Deal\u201d use of American leverage, including tariffs, less hard-line absolutism with other major powers.<\/p>\n

Mr. Rubio\u2019s evolution shouldn\u2019t come as a shock. After all, he is no longer his own boss; he works for President Trump \u2013 in two key capacities, the first to hold both titles since Henry Kissinger in the 1970s. That comes with perks, including (as national security adviser) an office steps away from the Oval Office and, last week, a ringside seat at the high-stakes presidential summit in China.<\/p>\n

Why We Wrote This<\/p>\n

Marco Rubio has found ways to execute a Trump foreign policy that shows an evolution in his own positions. It has made him stand out among the president\u2019s close advisers.<\/p>\n

But the job of being Mr. Trump\u2019s front man on foreign policy also brings profound responsibility, starting with a need to display the emotional intelligence required in dealing with a mercurial president, offer sage advice, and defend Mr. Trump\u2019s actions in public.<\/p>\n

Mr. Rubio has risen to the challenge, foreign policy analysts say, in how he blended his own core Reaganite neoconservative, pro-interventionist views and the \u201cAmerica First\u201d nationalism of the Trumpist \u201cMake America Great Again,\u201d or MAGA, movement.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have been genuinely surprised that he has not only survived but thrived in this administration,\u201d says Daniel Drezner, a professor at Tufts University\u2019s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. \u201cThere were a lot of reasons to think he was going to be the first one out.\u201d<\/p>\n

For starters, Professor Drezner adds, \u201cMAGA didn\u2019t trust him, obviously, as a former neocon.\u201d<\/p>\n

To critics, Mr. Rubio is a sellout, a politician with an eye on the 2028 presidential contest over any sense of principle, kowtowing to Mr. Trump in the name of winning over the president\u2019s base of support.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With little fanfare, Mr. Rubio instituted major personnel cuts early on at the State Department \u2013 and continues to do so<\/a>. As\u00a0national security adviser, he implemented a dramatic reduction in the National Security Council staff in an effort to combat the \u201cdeep state.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\"\"\/<\/p>\n

Secretary of State Marco Rubio walks out to speak to reporters at the James Brady Press Briefing Room in the White House, May 5, 2026, in Washington. <\/p>\n

Within the Trump orbit, Mr. Rubio\u2019s reinvention is noteworthy in other ways. Treated with derision as \u201cLittle Marco\u201d by candidate Trump when they competed in the 2016 GOP presidential primary, he is now lauded as an articulate explainer and defender of policy, charismatic when Vice President JD Vance can appear stilted, and a devout Catholic family man in a cabinet known for some controversial characters.<\/p>\n

Mr. Rubio\u2019s star turn earlier this month\u00a0in the White House briefing room<\/a>, relaxed and charming for 50 minutes as a fill-in press secretary, garnered international attention. His early May deployment to Rome, for meetings with Pope Leo XIV and the Italian prime minister to smooth over online clashes with Mr. Trump, also burnished his image as an effective envoy for the administration.<\/p>\n

In addition, it turns out, the president\u2019s definition of \u201cAmerica First\u201d does not necessarily equate with isolationism. This means he and Mr. Rubio were never as far apart in their worldview, and the U.S.\u2019s place in the world, as some may have thought. In his 2023 book, \u201cDecades of Decadence,\u201d well before Mr. Trump\u2019s reelection, Mr. Rubio laid out the case for continued engagement in the world \u2013 and a need to both honor the Reagan legacy and move on from his 1980s worldview.<\/p>\n

The U.S. is a \u201cnation in desperate need of a leader\u201d who understands that the threats to Mr. Trump’s vision of America \u201care different from the threats Reagan confronted and overcame,\u201d Mr. Rubio writes.<\/p>\n

In Cuba, for example,\u00a0that has meant both\u00a0working toward regime change<\/a>\u00a0and showing humanity toward its citizens. Last week, the U.S. State Department\u00a0repeated a willingness<\/a> to provide $100 million in humanitarian aid to the Cuban people.<\/p>\n

Mr. Rubio\u2019s Cuban heritage, as the son of immigrants, and fluent Spanish are a plus in GOP outreach to crucial Latino voters \u2013 and in his diplomacy. The ultimate prize for Mr. Rubio is an end to communist rule on the island nation that sits just 90 miles off the southernmost point of his native Florida. Earlier this year, the U.S. intensified its decadeslong embargo against Cuba, including an energy blockade that has caused widespread power outages.<\/p>\n

CIA Director John Ratcliffe\u2019s surprise visit to Cuba on Thursday, to discuss intelligence cooperation, economic stability, and security, is in line with Mr. Rubio\u2019s strategic goals. It was the first high-level official U.S. visit to the nation in 10 years. Since joining the second Trump administration, Mr. Rubio\u00a0has held secret meetings<\/a> with former President Ra\u00fal\u00a0Castro\u2019s grandson, part of the effort to move Cuba to a post-communist future.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\"\"\/<\/p>\n

People illuminate themselves with their phones while playing dominoes as a fire set up by residents protesting against prolonged power outages burns on a street in Havana, Cuba, May 14, 2026. <\/p>\n

On Friday, multiple news outlets reported<\/a> that the U.S. Justice Department is preparing to indict former President Castro over his alleged role in the 1996 shoot-down of planes operated by Miami-based Cuban exiles. The alleged plan raises expectations that the U.S. might try a military operation in Cuba similar to the January capture of Venezuela\u2019s president, who was brought to the U.S. to face narcoterrorism charges.<\/p>\n

In other key ways, Mr. Rubio\u2019s positions remain much as they always were \u2013 and in line with Mr. Trump\u2019s. He opposed the Obama-era Iran nuclear deal from the start, and applauded when the president ditched it during his first term. Today, he vigorously defends the U.S.-Israel war in Iran.<\/p>\n

In Venezuela, Mr. Rubio is\u00a0widely seen<\/a> as the mastermind of U.S. policy, including the capture of President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro. Mr. Rubio remains involved in the details of Venezuela\u2019s governance, as evidenced in\u00a0an interview last week<\/a> with Sean Hannity of Fox News on Air Force One en route to China.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019ve made some steady progress on improving Venezuela,\u201d Mr. Rubio said, laying out how its oil money now goes into a New York bank account to pay salaries of teachers, firefighters, police, and professors.<\/p>\n

Mr. Rubio is hardly a \u201cviceroy\u201d \u2013 a proxy ruler on behalf of a sovereign \u2013 but\u00a0that suggestion<\/a> soon after Mr. Maduro\u2019s capture added to the Rubio meme as\u00a0\u201cSecretary of Everything.\u201d<\/a> In addition to his two main titles, he is also still technically acting administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, which he has effectively dismantled, and for a time, acting archivist of the United States.<\/p>\n

Mr. Rubio\u2019s dual role today as both secretary of State and the president\u2019s national security adviser seems less intentional than when Mr. Kissinger did it. Mr. Rubio took over as national security adviser in May 2025, when Mike Waltz was ousted after\u00a0the \u201cSignalgate\u201d scandal<\/a>. (Mr. Waltz had accidentally included a journalist in a group chat on a major military operation.)<\/p>\n

Ever since, Mr. Rubio has been acting national security adviser, which may be the more important of his two primary roles. That\u2019s the job that gives him daily proximity to Mr. Trump, and the ability to influence his decisionmaking.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn any administration, being close to the president is where the power is,\u201d says Matthew Kroenig, vice president of the Atlantic Council and a former foreign policy adviser to the Rubio 2016 presidential campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s even more the case given the way [Mr. Trump] makes decisions,\u201d Dr. Kroenig adds. \u201cIt seems like there\u2019s not a big interagency process. It\u2019s a handful of people around the president who are really shaping his thinking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also unusual in the current administration is the fact that the president\u2019s main envoys dealing with the biggest global conflicts \u2013 Iran, Ukraine\/Russia, and Israel\/Gaza \u2013 are his son-in-law Jared Kushner and friend Steve Witkoff, not his secretary of State. Neither Mr. Kushner or Mr. Witkoff are government employees.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mr. Rubio is in the White House more than he\u2019s traveling, notes Dr. Drezner of the Fletcher School. \u201cTo the extent that he does travel \u2013 and I think this is politically savvy \u2013 it\u2019s often as cleanup,\u201d he adds, citing the secretary\u2019s trip to Europe after Mr. Trump\u2019s summit in Alaska with Russian President Vladimir Putin last August.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the end, Mr. Rubio\u2019s biggest impact on Trump administration policy may be in its focus on the Western Hemisphere<\/a>, as seen in the November 2025 National Security Strategy<\/a>. Call it \u201cAmericas First,” versus the singular America First, as it introduced a 21st century version of the 1823 Monroe Doctrine \u2013\u00a0or \u201cDonroe Doctrine” \u2013\u00a0\u00a0i.e., asserting the Western Hemisphere as the U.S.’s “neighborhood.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Venezuela and Cuba are important in today\u2019s Trumpian narrative, as are Mexico, Canada, Panama, and Greenland. For Mr. Rubio, a post-communist Cuba has always been the holy grail. But in other ways, his posture has evolved, blending aspects of his old neocon ways (e.g., foreign interventionism) with the MAGA values of America First, including trade protectionism.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In his book \u201cDecades of Decadence,\u201d Mr. Rubio made clear he had moved on from his support for economic globalization \u2013 including once-vocal support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In short, the Rubio transformation didn\u2019t happen just because he joined the Trump administration, says Dr. Kroenig of the Atlantic Council. Like many Republicans in the Trump era, Mr. Rubio has shifted over time as his party and its voters have shifted.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a more gradual evolution after 2016,\u201d says Dr. Kroenig.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As a United States senator from Florida, Marco Rubio was a high-profile \u201cneocon\u201d \u2013 a hawk on China…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":650116,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-650115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=650115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/650116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=650115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=650115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=650115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}