Marco Rubio in Speech at 2013 CPAC conference

On Abortion: I believe in protecting life but I'm not a chauvinist

In order to work together with people that you disagree with, there has to be mutual respect. That means I respect people who disagree with me on certain things, but they have to respect me too. Just because I believe that states should have the right to define marriage in the traditional way does not make me a bigot. Just because we believe that life--all human life--is worthy of protection at every stage of its development does not make me a chauvinist.

In fact, the people who are actually close minded in American politics are the people that love to preach about the certainty about science with regards to our climate, but ignore the absolute fact that science has proven that life begins at conception.

Source: Speech at 2013 Conservative Political Action Conf. Mar 14, 2013

On Corporations: The banks caused the mortgage crisis and we bailed them out

Many of our hardworking people have seen their jobs wiped out--jobs they've been doing for 20 years disappeared overnight. Many of them do things the right way--for example they pay their mortgages on time. And now when the housing bubble came, they were stuck with the bill. For bailing out the banks that caused it. For bailing out the people took out mortgages they couldn't afford to pay. Everywhere they look, they see trouble around them. They look at Washington DC--every week Washington's creating some sort of man-made crisis for them to worry about.

They don't want to take anything away from the vast majority of Americans in the hard working middle class. But they wonder who's fighting for them. And fighting for the hardworking everyday people of this country who do things right and do not complain. Because our hardworking middle class Is one of the things that makes America different and sets us apart from the rest of the world.

Source: Speech at 2013 Conservative Political Action Conf. Mar 14, 2013

On Foreign Policy: The China Dream is to surpass America as world leader

Yesterday there was a transition in the government of China. Their new leader loves to go around giving speeches where he refers to something called the China Dream. "The China Dream" refers to a book that was written by a Chinese army colonel. The gist of the book is that China's goal should be to surpass the United States as the world's preeminent military and economic power. That's what the China Dream means.

In the forward, another general writes that the 21st century should be a race to see who can become the champion country to lead world progress. So while we are here bickering, there is a nation trying to surpass us as the leading power in the world.

The Chinese Government provides the people no access to the Internet. If you escape China they actually put pressure on governments to forcibly return you. The Chinese Government uses forced labor. Do we want that to be the leading country in the world? So we want that to be the leading voice on this planet? That's the stakes.

Source: Speech at 2013 Conservative Political Action Conf. Mar 14, 2013

On Technology: Information age has changed world; people have not changed

What I sense from a lot of people I've been talking to was this fear that somehow America has changed--that are people changed. That's not true.

Our people have not changed. The vast majority of the American people are hard-working taxpayers who go to work every day; who volunteer in their communities. What's changed is the world around us.

Just think how much the world has changed in the last ten years. The global economy is real--we don't live in the national economy anymore. Everything you buy- everything you touch--it's all impacted by things that are happening halfway around the world. The information age is real. It's changed the world and it's made out life easier, but it's also changed our economy. You go into a grocery store today and you'll find machines doing the job that people once did. You find today at many businesses that 1 person, because of automation, can do the work that 5 people used to do. It's the world around us that has changed. And this has had an impact on our people

Source: Speech at 2013 Conservative Political Action Conf. Mar 14, 2013

The above quotations are from Speeches to Conservative Political Action 2013 Conference. Click here for other excerpts from Speeches to Conservative Political Action 2013 Conference. Click here for other excerpts by Marco Rubio. Click here for a profile of Marco Rubio.
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Page last updated: Dec 05, 2018