Video transcript
I have to tell you directly and personally that I regret voting for you for Secretary of State. I yield back. May I respond? You may, sir. Well, first of all, your regret for voting for me confirms I'm doing a good job based on what I know. Well, that's just a flippant statement, Mr. Secretary. Can I respond, Mr. Chairman? You may. I didn't ask. Senator, please let the Secretary have the floor. I'd be happy to, but then I can respond to his response. Your time's up, Senator, and woefully used, I might add. Your remarks do not represent the view of this committee. Well, I can't respond to everything he said because much of these are untrue, but I'll go through a few. First of all, I'm actually very proud of the work we've done with USAID. For example, I don't regret cutting $10 million for male circumcisions in Mozambique. I don't know how that makes us stronger and more prosperous as a nation. I don't regret psychosocial support services for the USAID. I raise to the end, Mr. Secretary. Senator, I'd ask you to suspend. You had seven straight minutes. I chose to use my time that way, Mr. Chairman. That's my right to use my time that way. Please suspend. Secretary Rubio. Well, I can go on. I mean, there's other things here. We spent $227,000 for Big Cat's YouTube channel from USAID. We spent $14 million for social cohesion in Mali, whatever the hell that means. So I can go on and on. I got the list here, and there's more that I didn't even bring the whole list. In the case of El Salvador, absolutely, absolutely. We deported gang members, gang members, including the one that you had a margarita with. And that guy is a human trafficker, and that guy is a gangbanger, and the evidence is going to be clear. In the days of time, you're going to see who you went to deliver. Mr. Chairman, please. Mr. Secretary Rubio has the floor. Mr. Chairman, he can't make unsubstantiated comments like that. Secretary Rubio has the floor. You had your time. Secretary Rubio should take that testimony to the federal floor in the United States because he hasn't done it under oath. Here's another point, okay? There is a division in our government between the federal branch and the judicial branch. No judge and the judicial branch cannot tell me or the president how to conduct foreign policy. No judge can tell me how I have to outreach to a foreign partner or what I need to say to them. And if I do reach to that foreign partner and talk to them, I have under no obligation to share that with a judiciary branch. Just like a judge cannot order me to negotiate with a foreign minister of Russia, they cannot order me to negotiate with a foreign minister or the president of El Salvador. And if I did negotiate with them, which we have responded to them, and we've told them we've had communications with the president of El Salvador, I am under no obligation under our division of powers in this country to share with the judicial branch how I conducted diplomacy of the United States. It would actually be counterproductive. If I started sharing with courts or frankly with the media, my conversations with foreign leaders and all of their details, no foreign leader would talk to me again and we would break trust with them. So I have complied with every court order. What I won't comply with is an order to disclose what I'm saying and what we're talking about with a foreign leader because then they won't talk to me. Democracy doesn't work that way. About the student visas, let me say this. I don't deport anybody and I don't snatch anybody. The State Department does not have officers in the street snatching everybody. What I do is revoke visas. And it's very simple. A visa is not a right, it is a privilege. People apply for student visas to come into the United States and study. And if you tell me that you're coming to the United States to lead campus crusades, to take over libraries and burn down, try to burn down buildings and acts of violence, we're not going to give up. We're not going to give you a visa. We're not going to give you a visa. We're not going to give you a visa. We're not going to give you a visa. Come on Mr. Secretary. And every single one of these cases, the factors are different. The bottom line is if you're coming here to stir up trouble on our campuses, we will deny you a visa. And if you have a visa and we find you, we will revoke you and we're going to do more. There are more coming. We're going to continue to revoke the visas of people who are here as guests and are disrupting our higher education facilities. People are paying money. These kids pay money to go to school and they have to walk a bunch of lunatics who are here on the computer. I need an op-ed to the tough newspapers disrupting the foreign policy of the United States. I want to do more. I hope we can buy more of these people. That's pathetic, Mr. Secretary. In fact, the other day, the other day, some guy's led a riot. I forgot what university it was. And I asked, please, can you find the arrest records of all the people that were arrested at that riot at that campus because if any of them have a visa, we're going to revoke you. I feel so much safer. All right. Lock up people like Ms. Osterg, Ms. Secretary.
Transcribed automatically. Expect errors in names and numbers.