WASHINGTON (AP) – Florida Sen. Marco Rubio is pinning his presidential hopes on the prospect that Republican voters will have the troubled world on their minds in the 2016 primaries – and that they’ll see a 43-year-old freshman lawmaker who argues for an aggressive U.S. posture abroad as the best candidate to take on global crises.
For Rubio, who remains unknown to many Americans, it’s a gamble of necessity as he searches for a way to break through the GOP pack.
In an interview with The Associated Press, Rubio said tumult in the Middle East, Eastern Europe and Latin America may drive voter interest in foreign policy higher than at any point in the last decade, despite the fact that international issues barely registered for voters in the last Republican primary and general election. He also previewed a campaign message that links U.S. economic prosperity to stability around the world.
“We’re 4 to 5 percent of the world’s population,” Rubio said. “So for us to grow our economy robustly and provide more economic opportunity to more people, we need to have millions of people around the world that can afford to trade with us, that can afford to buy our products and our services.”
Foreign policy often isn’t a winning formula in presidential politics, however.