India backer Rubio set to be Trump’s secretary of state: Media reports

New York, Nov 12: Foreign policy hardliner and India backer Marco Rubio will be President elect Donald Trump’s nominee for the nation’s top diplomatic job, according to several media outlets. The multiple reports on Monday night said that according to Trump insiders, whom they did not name, he plans to name the senator from Florida as his secretary of state.

The son of Cuban immigrants, Rubio was reported to have been on Trump’s shortlist of vice president candidates before he settled on JD Vance. Rubio takes a hardline on China and views India as the counter weight to Beijing in the region and globally. He introduced a Bill in July to strengthen India-US cooperation in Defence, citing the “increased aggression from Beijing” that India faces.

The US-India Defense Cooperation Act seeks to treat India as if it were of the same status as US allies such as Japan, Israel, Korea, and NATO allies regarding technology transfers, according to him. It would also give India “a limited exemption from CAATSA sanctions for purchases of Russian equipment that are currently used by the Indian military”, according to him.

The CAATSA (Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act) imposes sanctions on countries entering into military deals, among others, with Russia, Iran and North Korea, and it would affect India with its reliance on Russian armaments.

In a statement ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Washington last year, Rubio said, “We find ourselves at a new juncture in global history in which both India and the United States can further strengthen this vital partnership and build upon the foundation of our shared democratic values and national interests.”

“Our nations’ economic and security interests overlap on many of the most pressing issues, especially the growing hostility of the Chinese Communist Party in the Himalayas and in the Indian Ocean”, he said urging Congress and the administration to prioritise relations with India. While he has assumed strong postures against Russia, he appears to accept Trump’s line that the war with Ukraine should be ended with some compromise that some view as giving Moscow an edge and putting Kyiv at a disadvantage.

Elected three times to the Senate, he serves on the Foreign Relations Committee and the Subcommittee on Near East, South Asia, Central Asia, and Counterterrorism, and is the vice chair of the Select Intelligence Committee. He has also displayed an isolationist “America First” streak voting in April against a measure for aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan, protesting against President Biden’s lax border policies.

This was despite his staunch support for Israel. Rubio ran unsuccessfully against Trump for the Republican nomination in 2016, but endorsed him in 2020 and this year.