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Times recommends / U.S. Senate: Marco Rubio for Republicans

 
Sen. Marco Rubio is the only viable candidate in the Republican race for U.S. Senate, despite his apparent lack of interest in the job.
Sen. Marco Rubio is the only viable candidate in the Republican race for U.S. Senate, despite his apparent lack of interest in the job.
Published July 29, 2016

The Republican primary for U.S. Senate has unfolded differently than expected, with incumbent Marco Rubio seeking re-election after failing to win his party's nomination for president. Rubio's re-emergence drove most other Republicans out of the race except for developer Carlos Beruff, who has modeled his campaign after Donald Trump's. That leaves Rubio as the only viable alternative, despite his apparent lack of interest in the job.

After nearly abandoning his Senate campaign in 2010, Rubio rode the tea party wave of discontent to victory and soon began positioning himself for a run for the White House. Time featured him on a 2013 cover headlined, "The Republican Savior.'' In his greatest achievement, Rubio worked as a member of the Senate's "Gang of Eight'' that passed a bipartisan immigration reform bill that included tougher enforcement and a path to citizenship. But he caved under pressure from conservatives and abandoned the reforms, which were never voted on by the House. He supports a path to citizenship only after securing the borders and a yearslong process.

Rubio, 45, has built a conservative voting record and focused on foreign policy as a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He has been critical of President Barack Obama, pushing for more aggressive action over the years in areas such as the Middle East, Ukraine and Venezuela. Born in Miami to parents who fled Cuba, he opposes normalizing U.S. relations with the island and supports continuing the economic embargo. He wants to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and he slipped into a spending bill a provision that limits what government can spend to protect health insurers from losses tied to covering more sick people. He has opposed raising the federal minimum wage, the Iran nuclear deal negotiated by the Obama administration and stricter gun laws.

As he campaigned for president, Rubio had the worst voting record in the Senate from March 2015 to March 2016. Throughout much of his first term, he also showed little interest in Florida issues and spent virtually no time in public in Tampa Bay. Since deciding to run for re-election, Rubio has been more active on everything from flood insurance to the Zika virus to the algae blooms. He also has found his way more often to Tampa Bay.

Beruff, 58, is a successful homebuilder making his first run for public office. He has served on the boards of the Southwest Florida Water Management District and of a community college in Manatee County, and he chaired Gov. Rick Scott's Commission on Health Care and Hospital Funding.

Modeling himself after Scott and Trump as a business executive prepared to apply his skills to government, Beruff has aired ads declaring, "I'm not ashamed to support Trump" as Rubio keeps his distance. He embraces Trump's call to build a wall along the Mexican border, and he would ban travel from Middle East countries where terrorists operate — unless they are Christians who can produce church records. That sort of blanket religious discrimination should be unacceptable to every American.

Beruff also channels Trump's bluster. Asked how he would have reacted to a terrorist attack overseas, he responded, "I'd have wiped them off the face of the Earth.'' At a Republican Party meeting in May, he called Obama "an animal" and remains unapologetic. These are not the sorts of outbursts that would lead to consensus-building in the Senate.

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Perhaps in a second term, Rubio would be more focused on his job and rediscover Tampa Bay. In the Republican primary for U.S. Senate, the Tampa Bay Times recommends Marco Rubio.