Fox News "The Ingraham Angle" - Transcript: Sen. Rubio on whether Trump has reversed course on China

Interview

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INGRAHAM: Senator Rubio, you have been writing and speaking a lot about the China threat over the last several months, and this really took me by a complete surprise today with this seeming reversal of what I thought was a very commonsense approach to the Chinese telecom giant. What is your reaction tonight? The White House seemed to try to back off a little bit in reaction today. China will have to make concessions on its past cheating, frankly, but what is your reaction as of tonight?

SEN. MARCO RUBIO, R--FLORIDA: First of all, I don't feel bad for these companies because, frankly, they have benefited greatly and continue to benefit great greatly from the theft and intellectual cheating which is what the government does on behalf of their companies. What's really concerning is telecommunications is one of the 10 or 12 industries that China intends to dominate the world in. And so to be selling American technology to ZTE is going to allow them to get it and then reverse engineer it, and then they will make it themselves and they won't need us anymore. They do that in every industry. But remember, this enforcement action against ZTE was not a trade issue. It was because they got caught helping North Korea and helping Iran evade sanctions and they were punished for it. But frankly we should not be in the business -- ZTE should not be operating unfettered in the United States and they shouldn't have access to American technology.

INGRAHAM: Senator Rubio, there's always this tension between the national security side of things and the economic side of things. And it seems that Trump is trying to triangulate on this. Obviously there is concern about farmers and the soybean tariff that China has threatened to put on them, also with the upcoming talks with North Korea. Without a doubt China has played some role in facilitating perhaps how we've gotten to this point this far. Do you take that into consideration as you judge this?

RUBIO: No, because without national security you have no economy. And in the case of China, part of our national security threat is they intend to wipe out United States industries in 10 key sectors. It's called Made in China 2025. They have telegraphed it very clearly. They intend to dominate the world in these 10 industries, and one of the ways they do it is they take American secrets, they either spy on us and steal them or they get American companies to do business with them and then they take whatever it is we invented and they learn how to make it themselves even though they are not allowed to under the law, and then they get rid of us and then they start competing with us, subsidized by their government. You do that in enough industries and it becomes a national security threat. And then in their case of ZTE and telecommunications, these are devices that could be theoretically used -- not theoretically. They can be used to track people, to listen in without any court orders or anything of that nature. If this was a farm dispute that's one thing, but this is a direct threat to our national security and our economic well-being, which are interrelated.

INGRAHAM: Marco, Chuck Schumer today said -- and I've known you for so long so I just called you Marco. Excuse, Senator Rubio. Sorry about that.

RUBIO: Just don't say Polo.

(LAUGHTER)

INGRAHAM: Senator Rubio, Chuck Schumer tweeted out kind of in agreement with you and myself. But he was pretty harsh. He said make China great again. You don't believe that Donald Trump wants to -- is interested in making China great again or would purposely harm our national security interest by doing some type of deal with China on this, do you?

RUBIO: No, I don't. I just think there's a lot of people tripping over there. Every day some group of CEOs comes marching into the White House and tries to talk the president down from the strong stand that he has taken on China. There's a lot of voices, perhaps even some people within the administration that want to back down a little bit on the China thing. This confrontation with China is by far the most important thing facing this country on a global scale. This is going to define the next 80 years.
They intend to replace us.

INGRAHAM: I completely agree with you. The business interests, I would say if Goldman Sachs is happy about something regarding China I'm usually not happy. This is what -- on another issue, on the tax bill, this is what you were quoted in the "Washington Post" as saying about the GOP tax bill. You said if you look at all the benefits that are flowing to corporations, it was important to be able to go back and do more for working families, again in reference to the tax bill, otherwise the message is what it has been for 25 years for both parties, that is when push comes to shove, we want your vote but we are not all that concerned about the working class. This is what Trish Reagan said.

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RUBIO: I don't know what she is referring to when they say that. I am for lower taxes. I think the whole debate began with this. We have a corporate tax rate of 35. The Republican bill lowered it to 20. I said why don't we lower it to 21, which is still massive. Again, we are talking C-corporations. We're talking about Apple and Google, these multinationals, not talk about S-corporations, your everyday small business, midsize business. I'm talking about big, multinational corporations for the most part. I said instead of lowering to 20, let's lowered to 21, still a dramatic cut, and -- actually said 20.9, and let's use that 0.9 to fully expand the child tax credit for working families, people making, $30, $40, $50, $60,000 a year. And my argument was that 0.9 was better in the hands of these workers that have already been hurt by all these changes in the economy.

INGRAHAM: I get you, Senator Rubio, but it's over. I see where you're coming from, but that's over and now we have the midterms. And it's like Republicans have to be unified on this issue. And I can see the argument -- with all that to hang together here on this tax bill. It's what we have. It's not perfect. There's a lot more I wanted, we didn't get it.

RUBIO: The criticism is not about the tax bill. It is what it is and on that it's a positive. The issue is the attitude. The attitude that some people had towards that child tax credit that it's better off in the hands of these big corporations than it is in the hands of a working family. That attitude is going to be ongoing, and we cannot continue because working people in this country have been crushed over the last 20 years by all these changes. We need to think about that.

INGRAHAM: That's for sure. We'll see next year the full force of the tax bill kick in when they have to file their taxes under this new regime in 2019. Senator Rubio, before we let you go, big blockbuster story today in "The Hill." What you make of the story Mueller had not disclosed this before he was named of course special counsel?

RUBIO: First of all, Bob Levinson is a Floridian, the family is from Florida. I wanted to do everything possible within the law to get him home, and we met with the Trump administration about his case. He's unfairly detained. His case was forgotten at the end of the Obama administration when they're cutting deals with Iran. This is a man who served our country and was unjustly kidnapped by the Iranians.

INGRAHAM: But the Russians were working on it. This is what I'm saying, Senior, Rubio, a Russian oligarch used $25 million according to multiple sources of his own money to get this guy out. He's working with the FBI.

RUBIO: So I'm on the intelligence committee so I want to be careful about confirming or denying any sort of media articles because a lot of the work that's being done with regards to this -- I'm not confirming it. Like I said, I saw the same article. Suffice it to say that here's the bottom line. Mr. Mueller is conducting this investigation. If there is a conflict of interest at some point and it's born to be true, it would jeopardize the investigation. I'm not prepared to say that. We don't know all the facts. I think we'll see as this thing rolls forward and as he brings out -- this investigation has to end at some point. People will be able to look at who he went after and who he didn't and then ask these questions. But we should wait until that moment arrives. But on this particular case we have that article. I don't even know quite frankly how any of that is classified or not at this point and so I would be personally cautious. I'm trying to be evasive. I don't want to get in trouble here and go beyond where I should. But suffice it to say, for purposes of an investigation Bob Mueller should be able to finish his work and then -- it has to end at some point and we will be able to look at it all and say, hey, why did you do this or not do that?

INGRAHAM: I think we are going to learn a lot more about this in the days to come, but we really appreciate your voice on China and all these national security issues. Marco Rubio, thank you so much for bearing with us tonight. Thanks for joining.

RUBIO: Thank you. Thanks.

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