Marco Rubio is responding to attacks from Donald Trump regarding the reported mismanagement of his finances — sort of. He’s trying to refocus attention on his humble upbringing, which he says a political asset, and not a liability, as he sets out to become president.
Rubio’s monetary missteps were brought up at the CNBC debate last week, and he (incorrectly) dismissed them as “a litany of discredited attacks from Democrats.”
During the launch for Trump’s new book Tuesday, The Donald lobbed such insults at the Florida senator as: “Marco Rubio’s personal finances are discredited… All you have to do is look at his credit cards. I mean, he is a disaster with his credit cards… he certainly lives above his means, there’s no question about that.”
Wednesday afternoon on Fox News, Rubio replied: “I think it would be good for this country to have a president that knows what it’s like to owe money in student loans, like I once did — someone who grew up paycheck to paycheck.”
But wait a second, don’t we already have a president like that? The stuff Rubio said just there actually sounds like a good description of Barack Obama.
In fact, the current president was not able to pay off his student loans until 2004, when he signed a $1.9 million book deal for what would later become The Audacity of Hope. This should all sound very familiar to Rubio, who finally paid off his own student loan debt with the proceeds of his book An American Son.
Rubio also pivoted away from getting attacked by Donald Trump, by changing the subject to that of Hillary Clinton.
“And that’s why I look forward to that debate with Hillary Clinton,” he said. “How is she going to say that I don’t understand the plight of people that are struggling in America — when I myself, through my parents and our upbringing, lived it?”
Of course, it’s Donald Trump who is currently talking about Rubio’s finances — not Hillary Clinton.
