Secretary of State Marco Rubio sat down with Breitbart News at the State Department in Washington late last week for his first major exclusive long-form on-camera interview following his address at the Acropolis in Athens, Greece, where he described Americans as the 'heirs' of Western civilization and said that the things the United States believes as a country are important to the world.
The interview, reported by Breitbart, covered the thinking behind Rubio's Acropolis speech earlier this month, which he characterized as being 'at the core' of the America First foreign policy agenda. According to Breitbart, Rubio explained that the approach championed by President Donald Trump at the United Nations General Assembly last month centers on using American power to advance American interests—and that doing so often benefits allies and friends around the world, lifting up the entire West.
Rubio told Breitbart that many European and other Western leaders are coming around to this view of the world, particularly since his speech earlier this year at the Munich Security Conference and a similar address by Vice President JD Vance last year. He said 'it takes time' for those messages to 'translate into policy' after they sink in, but he is noticing a shift—especially 'privately'—from leaders around the world toward more concrete embrace of the Trump administration's vision.
Asked directly whether he would back off previous comments about not intending to run for president against Vance should Vance run in 2028, Rubio declined to answer, saying he has already said all he will say on the subject for now. He also made clear, according to Breitbart, that everyone in the administration—from himself to Vance to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent—is focused on the work at hand.
The Acropolis address itself drew sharp criticism from the left. The Orinoco Tribune, in a piece published Thursday, accused Rubio of praising colonialism and erasing history, quoting him as declaring the West 'the greatest civilization in the world' and a civilization 'that we must fight to defend today with the same passion as our forefathers did.' That outlet also quoted Rubio saying, 'Under President Trump, the United States has made its choice: We choose the unapologetic pursuit of national power.' The Tribune framed the speech as a paean to empire and noted that Rubio is the second person in U.S. history to serve simultaneously as secretary of state and national security advisor, after Henry Kissinger.
A separate critique published Friday in a piece titled 'What Secretary Rubio Forgot at the Acropolis' argued that the Greek inheritance includes 'the courage to question what deserves to be called great.'
Rubio's remarks come as the Trump administration continues to reshape American foreign policy around an explicit America First doctrine, with the secretary of state arguing that Western civilization's values—rooted in Athens and Rome—are not relics but living principles that Americans have inherited and must defend. The full interview is expected to be released in the coming days, according to Breitbart.
Our Take
Leave it to the Left to hear an American secretary of state proudly proclaim that the values of Athens and Rome belong to every American and immediately call it 'colonialism.' The Orinoco Tribune's screed is a perfect specimen of the pathology that has infected so much of the Western commentariat: the belief that the civilization that gave us the rule of law, representative government, and the very concept of individual liberty is something to apologize for rather than celebrate.
Rubio is right. Americans are the heirs of Western civilization—not because we are perfect, but because we are the inheritors of a tradition that, for all its flaws, produced the freest, most prosperous, and most humane societies in human history. The Acropolis address was not a call for empire; it was a call for confidence. And confidence is exactly what the Trump administration has restored after four years of a Biden regime that spent more time apologizing for America than defending it.
The critics sneering from the sidelines can question what deserves to be called great all they want. Real Americans know the answer: the country that defeated fascism, put a man on the moon, and still welcomes the tired, the poor, and the huddled masses yearning to breathe free. That is greatness. And Marco Rubio is right to say so.
What do you think? Should America's diplomats be proud of Western civilization, or apologize for it? Let us know in the comments.
