Marco Rubio announces candidacy for 2016
Conservative senator is the third Republican candidate
Senator Marc Rubio (R., Florida) is throwing his hat into the ring for the GOP presidential nomination, joining Ted Cruz and Rand Paul.
Rubio, 43, spoke exclusively with ABC News ahead of a rally in Miami where he delivered his first speech as a candidate.
“I think this country’s at a generational moment,” he told George Stephanopoulos, “where it needs to decide not what party it wants in charge but what kind of country are we going to want to be moving forward.”
Rubio, a freshman senator and the youngest person to declare their candidacy so far, is positioning himself as a fresh political face. He believes that America “needs a Republican Party that is new and vibrant, that understands the future, has an agenda for that future.”
At his speech in Miami, Rubio played heavily on the generational aspect of his campaign, The Guardian reports. Taking a swipe at Hillary Clinton, who declared her candidacy yesterday, Rubio stated, “Just yesterday a leader from yesterday began a campaign for president by promising to take us back to yesterday. Yesterday is over. And we’re never going back.”
Indeed, Rubio’s manner and rhetoric had more than a passing resemblance to Barack Obama in 2008, referencing his father, “He wanted all the doors that closed for him to open for me,” and his desire to overcome humble upbringings (he is the son of Cuban immigrants). “That journey from behind that bar [where his father worked] to this podium, that’s the essence of the American dream,” he said.
He also laid claim to middle class voters, appealing to single mothers, students, and struggling families, stating, “the American miracle lives on…. This will be the message of my campaign, and the purpose of my presidency.”
For LGBT voters, Rubio is a staunch conservative on social issues. When same-sex marriage was legalized in his state, Rubio told reporters, “I do not believe that there is a U.S. Constitutional right to same-sex marriage.”
During a speech at Catholic University last year, Rubio stated that he supports a traditional definition of marriage,”not because I seek to discriminate against people who love someone of the same sex, but because I believe that the union of one man and one woman is a special relationship that has proven to be of great benefit to our society, our nation and our people, and therefore deserves to be elevated in our laws.”
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