Some Dems back Trump-pick Rubio for Secretary of State but remain critical of Hegseth, Gabbard and Gorka
A handful of Democrats are sounding their approval of Republican Florida Sen. Marco Rubio as Secretary of State but others continue to doubt some cabinet picks made by President-elect Donald Trump.
“I think Marco Rubio is enormously well-qualified for the job for which he’s been nominated,” Democratic Senator-elect from California Adam Schiff said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday morning. “I still want to ask questions, I’m not going to completely pre-judge even him, but he’s unquestionably qualified.”
Trump has made a flurry of cabinet picks in the last two weeks, naming his choices for all 15 heads of the executive departments. Eyes are now on the U.S. Senate to confirm the candidates.
Rubio is deemed one of the “less MAGA” options within Trump’s circle, a Trump ally told NBC News earlier this month, with another saying that he has become “far more aligned with the President on issues regarding tariffs.”
Trump campaigned in support of universal tariffs in the 2024 election cycle, with a specifically harsh 60% tariff on goods from China.
Rubio is notoriously tough on China and is a fierce advocate for the demonetization of social media platform TikTok, owned by China’s ByteDance, in the United States. He is also hawkish on Iran while remaining ambivalent about support for Ukraine.
Democratic Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman also said that he is a “fan” of Rubio in an interview with Fox News’ “Fox News Sunday,” and said he will vote to confirm him.
Fetterman said he might also “enthusiastically vote yes” for Rep. Elise Stefanik to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, and for union-friendly Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer as Labor secretary.
Fetterman also said he is keeping an open mind for other candidates, such as his former rival for the Pennsylvania Senate seat Dr. Mehmet Oz for Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services administrator.
“I’m not going to pre-hate this. I’m going to have an open conversation for anyone that I’m open to having part of that conversation,” Fetterman said.
Democratic Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth said she has “a friendship” with Rubio and said she’s looking forward to talking to him about his policies.
Duckworth, a combat veteran injured in Iraq, weighed in on Trump’s defense and veteran affairs picks, as well, in her interview with CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday morning. While the senator said she is open to conversations with Republican Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Veteran Affairs, she deemed Fox News host Pete Hegseth “unqualified” for the position of Secretary of Defense.
“He never commanded a company, let alone battalions, brigades or whole armies,” Duckworth said of Hegseth, who is an Army National Guard veteran.
“There are ways to be disruptors without actually putting people who have never run an organization larger than a platoon to be Secretary of Defense,” Duckworth continued, adding that Collins would be a good example. “The VA has been having a terrible issue with their electronic medical records program. Hopefully Doug Collins gets in there and is a disruptor.”
Hegseth has also been under fire for a 2017 police investigation in connection with an alleged sexual assault at a California hotel.
Another name that has drawn substantial criticism from the Senate is former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s candidate for Director of National Intelligence.
Sen.-elect Schiff said Gabbard’s lack of experience in the House Intelligence Committee, as well as her purported Kremlin ties, concern him.
Sen. Duckworth alleged that Gabbard is “compromised,” and she worries that the former congresswoman couldn’t pass a background check.
“I think that she is someone who is wholly backing and supportive of [Russian President Vladimir Putin], and I worry that she will not have America’s best interests at heart,” Duckworth said.
Some Republicans, however, refute the claims that Duckworth is a Russian asset.
“I think it’s insulting. It’s a slur, quite frankly,” Republican Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Meanwhile, H.R. McMaster, who was previously national security adviser during Trump’s first term as president, said he doesn’t view Sebastian Gorka, Trump’s former national security adviser, as the right person to advise on national security in the second term.
“I think that the President [and] others who are working with him will probably determine that pretty quickly,” McMaster said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday.
McMaster, who has been openly critical of some aspects of Trump’s foreign policy agenda after his time in the administration, also said he is worried about some Republican officials’ tendencies to parrot Russian President Putin’s talking points.
“They’ve got to disabuse themselves of this, you know, strange affection for Vladimir Putin,” McMaster said.
The vocal pushback from Democrats in Congress has led Trump to float the possibility of forcing the Senate into an extended recess in 2025 to bypass the confirmation process when appointing Cabinet officials.
Recess appointments are “and should be on the table,” Republican Senator Bill Hagerty of Tennessee told ABC News’ “This Week” on Sunday.
“This is a constitutionally available tool. What we want to see is Democrats cooperate with us. But if the resistance movement gets as heavy as it was. … We need to put a team in place around him, and [Trump] needs every tool at his disposal to do that,” Hagerty said.
