Rubio fires back at Paul

Their fight isn’t over.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio struck back at Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul late Friday as the first battle of the GOP primary spilled over to Twitter and splashed across Facebook then resumed on the airwaves, a preview of the Republican Party’s coming cage match over foreign policy.


“I think it’s unfortunate that Rand has decided to adopt Barack Obama’s foreign policy on [Cuba],” Rubio told radio host Mark Levin. “[He] basically repeated the talking points of the president. And that’s fine, he has every right to support the president’s foreign policy, that’s who he wants to line up with, but I’m telling you, it isn’t going to work.”

Rubio said improving relations with Cuba will only put more money in the hands of the Cuban military instead of its citizens.

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“All that’s going to change here is that there’s going to be more money going into Cuba, meaning more money going into the pockets of these folks,” Rubio said. “And what that means is they’re now going to be able to solidify themselves in power. Forever, after a transition.”

Paul has yet to respond to the latest salvo in an ongoing skirmish between the likely 2016 candidates over their opposing views of Obama’s decision to restore relations with Cuba.

First, on Thursday, Rubio ripped into Paul’s support for Obama’s call to lift the five-decade embargo.

“Like many people who have been opining, he has no idea what he’s talking about,” the hawkish Florida senator told Fox News’ Megyn Kelly.

Rubio was responding to this from his Senate colleague, and putative 2016 rival: “The 50-year embargo just hasn’t worked, if the goal was regime change, it sure doesn’t seem to be working,” the Kentucky senator said in a radio interview earlier in the day. “Probably, it punishes the people more than the regime because the regime can blame the embargo for hardship.”

Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, has emerged this week as the furious face of the GOP’s opposition to Obama’s opening to Cuba. While it does not lift the embargo — that would require congressional approval — the policy shift does ease restrictions and open diplomatic ties.

“The embargo is not what’s hurting the Cuban people, it’s the lack of freedom and the lack of competent leaders,” Rubio continued.

Paul shot back on Friday in a pointed series of tweets and Facebook posts.

“Hey @marcorubio if the embargo doesn’t hurt Cuba, why do you want to keep it?” Paul began.

He fired off three more tweets:

Senator @marcorubio is acting like an isolationist who wants to retreat to our borders and perhaps build a moat. I reject this isolationism. — Senator Rand Paul (@SenRandPaul) December 19, 2014

The United States trades and engages with other communist nations, such as China and Vietnam. So @marcorubio why not Cuba? — Senator Rand Paul (@SenRandPaul) December 19, 2014

. @marcorubio what about the majority of Cuban-Americans who now support normalizing relations between our countries? http://t.co/0qhSOeD9Va — Senator Rand Paul (@SenRandPaul) December 19, 2014

“After 50 years of conflict, why not try a new approach?” the Kentucky senator followed up in a Facebook post. “[L]et’s be clear that Senator Rubio does not speak for the majority of Cuban-Americans.”

In a TIME op-ed, Paul took a less direct approach, but his target was unmistakable. “Emotions understandably run high for those whose parents and grandparents had their land and their lives taken from them,” he wrote. “But if our goal is to defeat Castro and defeat communism then perhaps we should step back and ask ourselves, ‘Has the embargo worked?’ If we allow the passions to cool, maybe just maybe, we might conclude that trade is better than war and that capitalism wins every time a people get a chance to see its products.

“Let’s hope cooler heads will ultimately prevail and we unleash a trade tsunami that washes the Castros once and for all into the sea,” he continued.

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