Marco Rubio Marco Antonio RubioFlorida senators pushing to keep Daylight Savings Time during pandemic Hillicon Valley: DOJ indicts Chinese, Malaysian hackers accused of targeting over 100 organizations | GOP senators raise concerns over Oracle-TikTok deal | QAnon awareness jumps in new poll Intelligence chief says Congress will get some in-person election security briefings MORE credited an unlikely lawmaker when discussing Veterans Affairs issues at Thursday night's GOP debate: Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders Bernie SandersKenosha will be a good bellwether in 2020 Biden's fiscal program: What is the likely market impact? McConnell accuses Democrats of sowing division by 'downplaying progress' on election security MORE.

Rubio called for greater accountability of the VA and touted his work on a bill that grants the secretary of that department the authority to fire senior executives.

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"One of the things I'm proudest of is that in my time in the U.S. Senate working with Jeff Miller here from Florida in a bipartisan way, and I'll give him credit — Bernie Sanders was a part of this — we passed a VA accountability bill," Rubio said at CNN’s debate in Miami, just five days ahead of the state’s critical winner-take-all primary.

"Since we passed that law, no one's been fired for outreach, no one's been fired for calls going to the voicemail, no one's been disciplined, no one's been demoted," Rubio said.

"When I'm president of the United States, if you work at the VA and you are not doing a good job, you will be fired from your job at the VA," he added.