Monday in Miami, FL, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) announced he is running for the Republican nomination in the 2016 presidential race.
Rubio slammed Hillary Clinton, who announced her 2016 Democratic bid yesterday, by saying, “Just yesterday, a leader from yesterday began a campaign for president by promising to take us back to yesterday. Yesterday is over.”
Rubio continued, “While our people and our economy are pushing the boundaries of the 21st century, too many of our leaders and their ideas are stuck in the 20th century. They’re busy looking backwards, so they do not see how jobs and prosperity today depend on our ability to compete in the global economy. And so our leaders put us at a disadvantage by taxing and borrowing and regulating like it was 1999.”
“They look—they look for solutions in yesterday, so they do not see the good paying modern jobs require different skills and more education than the past,” he added. “So they blindly support an outdated higher education system that is too expensive and too inaccessible to those who need it most. And they have forgotten that when America fails to lead, global payoff inevitably follows. So they appease our enemies, they betray our allies and they weaken our military. Now look, at the turn of the 19th century, a generation of Americans harnessed the power of the industrial age and they transformed this country into the leading economy in the world and the 20th century became the American century. Well, now the time has come for our generation to lead the way towards a new American century.”
He hit hard on the generational theme, saying, “This election is a generational choice about what kind of country we will be. Now just yesterday, a leader from yesterday began a campaign for president by promising to take us back to yesterday. Yesterday is over. And we are never going back. You see, we Americans are proud of our history, but our country has always been about the future. And before us now is the opportunity to author the greatest chapter yet in the amazing story of America. But we can’t do that by going back to the leaders and ideas of the past. We must change the decisions we are making by changing the people who are making them. And so that is why tonight, grounded by the lessons of our history but inspired by the promise of our future, I am announce my candidacy for president of the United States.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN