Washington (CNN) Sen. Marco Rubio pushed back against Trump administration claims that there's no direct link between the Saudi crown prince and the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, saying that "there is no way" Mohammed bin Salman wasn't aware of the killing and that he very likely ordered it.

"We don't need direct evidence that he ordered the code red on this thing," Rubio, R-Florida, said Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union." "The bottom line is that there is no way that 17 people close to him got a charter plane, flew to a third country, went into a consulate, killed and chopped up a man, and flew back, and he didn't know about it, much less order it."

Despite the CIA's assessment in November that the crown prince had personally ordered the journalist's killing, President Donald Trump and the State Department have maintained that they can't punish the Saudi prince because the US government has not reached a final conclusion about who is responsible for Khashoggi's death.

Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also argue that foreign policy interests mean the US shouldn't take further action after sanctioning men involved in the murder, many of whom were from the prince's inner circle.

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