Marco Rubio Shows Genuine But Useless Talent in Gun Debate

(Bloomberg View) -- Senator Marco Rubio, who in his current iteration is stationed somewhere between the rising star and compromised warhorse of Republican politics, is a complicated figure, as reactions to his appearance at this week’s CNN town hall on gun violence confirm.

Rubio either A) courageously entered a lion’s den, allowing himself to be pummeled by grieving teens and family members traumatized by the mass murder in Parkland, Florida, that took the lives of loved ones. Or B) cynically filibustered his way through a tragic event without ever offering a genuine commitment to address a horrific problem.

With Rubio it’s often best to choose C) Both.

The Florida senator is maddening precisely because he has such genuine and obvious political talent. He may not be much of a legislator, but he nonetheless takes the time to gain a solid grasp of issues, which he often articulates with ease and clarity. His ambition, the engine of every great politician, is bracing. And his engaging personal story, as the son of poor Cuban immigrants, is what American Dreams are (still) made of.

But in dreams begin responsibilities, and when it comes to Rubio, responsibility seems ever prone to work stoppages — both in him and in a twisted political culture that seems determined to thwart his best instincts.

Rubio was mostly impressive working the CNN town hall. With both President Donald Trump, the scripted maestro of his own carefully contained meeting on guns the same day, and Florida Governor Rick Scott shrinking from the field, Rubio had political cover to skip the event. His absence would have been grudgingly noted, but only the most serious grudges can be sustained amid the maelstroms of the Trump era.

As the sole Republican on stage, Rubio was bound to bear the burden of his party’s unspoken but undeniable calculation on guns: Increased massacres, suicides and murders are a price the GOP is reluctantly willing to pay to keep the gun lobby happy and to keep single-issue gun fanatics voting Republican. Since that’s not a message Republicans can deliver in public, debates on guns invariably leave them scrambling for cover behind the Second Amendment — minus the “well-regulated militia” part — and murmuring NRA-approved pablum about mental health that almost never translates into funding or legislation.

Rubio did his share of dodging, occasionally stammering as he tried the patience of a hostile audience. But as he gained confidence he also grew more forthright, refusing to renounce the NRA’s contributions to his campaigns, while also saying that he is newly open to policies, such as raising the age limit on rifle purchases and imposing restrictions on high-capacity magazines, which the NRA opposes. 

That capacity to see higher ground is part of what’s so tantalizing about Rubio, who always seems most sincere when most moderate and rational. Along with his relative youth and Cuban background, his basic reasonableness is what makes him appear a credible bridge from a party wallowing in Trumpist reaction to one that might reimagine American conservatism as something more than the sum of its resentments and myths.

But Rubio seems unable to build such a bridge, and the party seems unwilling to let him try. His machinations on immigration — he was against amnesty before he was for it before he turned, with nativists and talk-show hosts yapping at his heels, against it finally — were a travesty.

“I have a special cold, dark place in my heart for Marco Rubio,” immigration advocate Frank Sharry, who is far from mean-spirited, told Rolling Stone. “I’ve been around politicians for 30 years, and I know they have to lean and pander, but to see him argue for immigration reform in June 2013, and then argue with equal conviction against it a few months later, that is really disturbing.”

Likewise, when it became clear during the 2016 presidential primary that the optimism, decency and reason expressed by Jeb Bush and John Kasich were tickets to GOP oblivion, Rubio scrambled aboard the night train.

Rolling down the track, he proved no match for Trump’s darkness, nor could he compete with the more holistic cynicism of Ted Cruz or Chris Christie, the latter of whom dismantled Rubio at a debate in New Hampshire, exposing Rubio’s robotic assault on Barack Obama as the stage work of an unbeliever pretending to be in the grip of the spirit.

Perhaps a better party would help him fulfill his natural potential, bracing him when he slips and providing the scaffolding that Rubio needs to raise himself up, with force and gravity. He is still young. But Rubio exists in the confines of the Republican Senate, where Jeff Flake is being hounded from office for failing to worship Trump’s meanness, and the eloquent Ben Sasse, squirming in his pew, holds his tongue lest he follows his Arizona colleague into banishment.

No one rises here; all descend. Instead of forming a bridge to the future, Rubio’s another soul lost in the void.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Francis Wilkinson writes editorials on politics and U.S. domestic policy for Bloomberg View. He was executive editor of the Week. He was previously a national affairs writer for Rolling Stone, a communications consultant and a political media strategist.

To contact the author of this story: Francis Wilkinson at fwilkinson1@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Katy Roberts at kroberts29@bloomberg.net.

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