Secretary of State Marco Rubio lied up a storm on Tuesday while being confronted by Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland during testimony in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Van Hollen slammed Rubio for his role in dismantling the United States Agency for International Development, harming vulnerable populations abroad, and enabling President Donald Trump's inhumane and unconstitutional deportations of immigrants and activists.
“Like the McCarthy era witch hunts of the 1950s, your campaign of fear and repression is eating away at foundational values of our democracy,” Van Hollen said.
He quoted attorney Joseph Welch’s famous line to the communist-obsessed Sen. Joseph McCarthy during the Red Scare of the 1950s: “Have you no sense of decency?” Then he turned that same question on Rubio and added, “You have shown in your words, in your actions, what the answer is.”
After being dressed down so thoroughly, Rubio began spewing Trump administration talking points about alleged government waste at USAID.
“I asked about Sudan, senator,” Van Hollen interrupted, referring to the deadly consequences of the Trump administration’s massive cuts to our foreign policy budget. Republican committee chair Jim Risch of Idaho, a Trump sycophant, gaveled Van Hollen to allow Rubio to continue.
Tensions escalated as Rubio pivoted to defending the deportation program by throwing out a series of unsubstantiated allegations against Maryland resident Kilmar Abrego Garciam who was deported to El Salvador and imprisoned there along with more than 230 Venezuelan migrants based on alleged gang affiliations—claims the U.S. government has yet to prove with any meaningful evidence.
Van Hollen, who traveled to El Salvador to meet with Garcia and ensure his safety, was justifiably enraged by Rubio’s characterization of the legal resident and sheet metal apprentice as “a human trafficker” and “a gang banger,” and his claims that “the evidence is going to be clear in the days to come.”
“Mr. chairman, he can't make unsubstantiated comments like that,” Van Hollen said. “Senator Rubio should take that testimony to the federal court of the United States, because he hasn’t done it under oath.”
When Rubio tried again to defend the detention of people like Rümeysa Öztürk, the Tufts University doctoral student who was abducted by ICE agents and detained in a Louisiana correctional facility for 45 days after writing an op-ed critical of Israel, Van Hollen had enough, calling Rubio “pathetic.”
You can watch some of the highlights of Van Hollen calling out Rubio’s abject failure to protect Americans and the Constitution, which ultimately sent Rubio into a tizzy, below.
Republished with permission from Daily Kos.
