Marco Rubio defends Trump remarks on immigrants “poisoning the blood” of the U.S.

Florida Senator Marco Rubioa possible vice-presidential choice for the former president donald trumpdefended Trump’s past comments about immigrants”poisoning the blood of our country” in a Spanish-language interview on Wednesday with Telemundo.

“I think he talks this way and that way,” Rubio said in Spanish, with an English translation provided by the network, when asked whether Trump could win the Latino vote despite those comments.

“There are Hispanics in your cabinet, or rather, on your team. As the press mentions, he is considering one of them as his vice presidential running mate,” Rubio added, in what appeared to be a reference to himself. “He has very strong ties to the community.”

Under further questioning, Rubio said Trump’s comment wasn’t really about race.

“It’s a saying he uses, but it has nothing to do with race, because at the end of the day he’s talking about the country, not the population,” Rubio said. “The country is threatened by this influx of people, which we now know includes even criminals and terrorists.”

During the interview, Rubio also expressed support for Trump’s plans for mass deportations across the country, telling Telemundo “that’s U.S. law.”

“I’m going to do the big deportation, the biggest ever,” Trump said in a recent interview with Fox News. “Eisenhower did the biggest, this will be the biggest. But it’s a very difficult thing. What they did to our country is unthinkable.”

In 2016, Rubio said carrying out mass deportations of more than 11 million undocumented immigrants in the US was not “a realistic policy,” but now says his views have changed since then.

“My thought at the time was to find a process for those people who are not criminals and at the same time do something, so that this never happens again. Now, in addition to these 11 million, in recent years we have welcomed another 9 or 10 million people. It’s a huge and completely different problem.”

Rubio’s views on mass deportations are in line with sentiments expressed by voters across the country.

According to a recent CBS News Poll62% of voters said they would favor, in principle, a new government program to deport all undocumented immigrants living in the US illegally.

The Democratic Party harshly criticized Rubio for defending Trump’s characterization of immigrants.

“Donald Trump’s declaration that immigrants are ‘poisoning the blood of our country’ is the kind of dangerous language used by the likes of Hitler and Mussolini – and Marco Rubio is willing to defend him just for the opportunity to be his running mate of Trump,” DNC spokeswoman Kenia Guerrero said after Rubio’s interview. “Rubio has lost his last shred of dignity only to compete in a race to the bottom to be on an extreme MAGA ticket in November that is woefully out of touch with the voters who will decide this election.”

Although Democrats condemned Rubio’s comments in the interview as anti-immigrant, Latino political analysts say the Florida senator was an effective messenger for the Trump campaign by delivering Trump’s rhetoric in Spanish to millions of Latinos in the US.

“Here you have a potential national vice presidential candidate for the Republican Party literally doing what no other candidate on this stage is doing,” said Julio Ricardo Valera, founder of the newsletter The Latino.

“He just gave an interview in Spanish. He could be a Latino vice-presidential candidate. He ticks a lot of boxes for the Trump campaign and could be a buffer to Trump’s extremism.”

Asked about the possibilities of becoming Trump’s vice presidential running mate during the interview, Rubio said he had not had any conversations with the Trump campaign about the matter, but said “it’s an honor to be considered” and “a big opportunity to continue serving.” “

Their relationship was not always warm. In 2016, when Trump and Rubio were Republican presidential candidates, Trump referred to Rubio as “Little Marco,” while Rubio mocked Trump for the size of his hands: “You know what they say about men with small hands? You can’t trust them,” he said of Trump. The two had contentious exchanges also on the debate stage.

Asked about their relationship, Rubio responded, “It’s like asking a boxer why he punched his opponent. We were competing.” He added that he worked well with Trump during his administration.