Rubio: ‘I don’t anticipate a single one of our partners will ask' about Jan. 6 pardons
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Tuesday he doesn’t think other world leaders will ask him about President Trump’s decision to pardon nearly all Jan. 6 defendants.
ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, in an interview with the new head of the State Department on Tuesday morning, noted that Rubio called Jan. 6, 2021, a “national embarrassment” in a video he shared on the social platform X that day. He asked what message he thinks Trump's pardons sends to other leaders around the world.
“I don’t anticipate a single one of our partners will ask about it, obviously,” Rubio said. “My job is to focus on the foreign policy of the United States. I have a different job this morning and a different focus. … I won’t be opining on domestic matters at this point.”
Rubio was officially sworn in as Secretary of State by Vice President Vance on Tuesday morning after the Senate on Monday voted 99-0 to confirm him.
Stephanopoulos also asked if Rubio no longer believes that the events of Jan. 6 impacts the U.S. standing in the world.
“Well, as a senator, I had an opinion on all kinds of domestic matters,” Rubio said. “But now, I’m focused singularly on foreign policy and how I interact with our allies. For example, my first meeting right out of the box, as soon as I’m sworn in and get over to the State Department, is what the members of the so-called quad, which are important allies in Australia, and Japan, and India. And we’ll be talking to them, and we’ll be focused on that. None of these domestic topics are going to come up.”
Trump, in one of his first acts as president from the Oval Office, said Monday night that he granted roughly 1,500 “full, complete and unconditional pardons” for those charged in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack. There have been 1,583 defendants charged.
The pardons clear the way for potentially hundreds of his supporters to be released from prison in the coming days, some of whom were sentenced to years in prison for violently attacking law enforcement that day.
Also in an interview with NBC’s "Today" on Tuesday morning, Rubio said he didn’t want to engage with domestic politics when asked what message the pardons sends to the rest of the world.
“Well, we're going to focus on what makes America stronger and more prosperous and safer. I’m not going to engage in political domestic debates. I can’t,” Rubio said. “In the role of State department, my job is to focus on the president's foreign policy, and it’s going to be a foreign policy that's frankly as straightforward as any in modern times.”