Check out the following exchange between Sen. Tim Kaine and former Sen. Marco Rubio, now Secretary of State (after having been confirmed, incredibly, by a 99-0 margin; that’s right, ZERO of Rubio’s colleagues, who should have known better, voted against his confirmation!), as it’s VERY revealing about the Trump administration’s warped, fact-free, arbitrary, scornful-of-the-rule-of-law, racist worldview.
Sen. Tim Kaine: “As far as I know, the United States has not – or the administration has not – withdrawn the executive order, so there’s essentially from this administration no refugee programs for anyone, except in early February the president announced a
special refugee program for Afrikaner farmers, justified a) by some concerns about South African foreign policy, but b) a claim that these were persecuted individuals. So right now the US refugee program allows a special program for Afrikaner farmers, the first group of whom arrived at Dulles Airport in Virginia not long ago while shutting off the refugee program for everyone else. Do you think Africana farmers are the most persecuted group in the world?”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio: “I think those 49 people that came certainly felt they were persecuted and they’ve passed
every every sort of check mark that had to be checked off in terms of meeting the requirements for that. They live in a
country where farms are taken and land is taken on a racial basis.”
Kaine: “OK, do you think they’re more persecuted than Uyghurs or Rohingas or more persecuted than political dissidents in Cuba or Venezuela or Nicaragua, more persecuted than those who would be threatened should they be returned to Afghanistan
by violence by the Taliban?”
Rubio: “The problem we face there is the volume problem; if you look at all the persecuted people of the world, it’s millions of people – they can’t all come here and we had refugee programs…”
Kaine: “So why prioritize Afrikaner farmers?”
Rubio: “Because it’s a small subset, it’s a new issue and the president identified it as a problem and wanted to use it as an
example. But that’s different from having these refugee programs that were basically spent spending money to put people up in communities and accommodate them, and it was acting as a magnet, millions of people entered illegally and today the border is sealed…”
Kaine: “Let me challenge you, and I’m just going to say
for the public, if you want to understand about the quote persecution of African farmers, go look at the composition of
the South African government since July of 2024. There’s a government of national unity and the opposition party to
the ANC, the Afrikaner party, the democracy alliance is part of the
governing coalition – they joined the governing coalition a
year ago and the leader of that party who was given the remit of agriculture minister…is the leader of the former Afrikaner party, still widely representing Afrikaners; he is the minister of agriculture in South Africa right now. I assert that this claim that there’s persecution of Afrikaner farmers is completely specious. Are you aware ever during the apartheid era in South Africa did the United States establish a special program to allow South African blacks who were treated as secondclass citizens in the apartheid program a special program so they could claim refugee status in the United States?”
Rubio: “No, because that was probably in ninth grade or eighth grade at the time.”
Kaine: “I don’t expect you to know, I’ll just tell you – NEVER has there been a program, a special program for Africans to come in as refugees to the United States. We’ve allowed special programs for people being persecuted for their religion, Soviet-era Jews. We’ve allowed special programs for people fleeing from communism – Cuba, Vietnam, the Soviet Union. We’ve never allowed a special program to allow Africans into the United States in an expedited refugee status until now – Afrikaner farmers living in a nation governed by a government of national unity that includes the main Afrikaner party…Now would you agree with me, Mr. Secretary, that if we’re interpreting the statutory phrase ‘a well-justified fear of persecution’, we should try to do that in an even-handed way?”
Rubio: “I think we should try to do that in the interest of
the national security of the United States. ”
Kaine: “OK, I agree with you too, we should. Should we try to do it in an even-handed way? So for example should we say if you’re persecuted on the grounds of your religion. we’ll let you in if you’re a Christian, but not if you’re a Muslim?”
Rubio: “I think that the United States has a right to allow into this country and prioritize allowance of who they want to allow to come in.”
Kaine: “I’m going to ask you…So a well-justified fear of persecution?”
Rubio: “Yeah, they thought their farms are being burned down and they would be killed; I think that’s a pretty good justification
for wanting to come – they’re afraid for their lives.”
Kaine: “And should it be applied in an even-handed way?”
Rubio: “Our foreign policy doesn’t require even-handedness…”
Kaine: “The statutory phrase says you are entitled to entrance
as a refugee if you demonstrate a well-justified fear of persecution…so can you have a different standard based upon the color of somebody’s skin, would that be acceptable?”
Rubio: “Well I’m not the one arguing that, apparently you are, because you don’t like the fact that they’re white and that’s why they’re coming.”
Kaine: “This is a very easy thing to say.”
Rubio: “The United States has a right to pick and choose who they allow into the United States.”
Kaine: “Even based on the color of somebody’s skin?”
Rubio: “No one’s…You’re the one that’s talking about the color of their skin, not me. These are people whose farms were being burned down and they were killed because of the color of their skin….You’ve demonstrated enough because you think anyone should be allowed into this country for any reason…”
Kaine: “Who has said that?”
Rubio: “We are going to prioritize people that come into our country on the basis of what’s in the interest of this country, that’s a small number of people…a million people come to this country every year legally…”
Kaine: “And now there is one group of people that have an easy pass into this country for the first time. This administration has said Afrikaners get an easy pass and refugee programs for the remainder of the world are shut off. And you can’t say to the American public that we should apply this statute in an even-handed way…Shocking…”
Rubio: “You shouldn’t be shocked, it should be applied in the national interest of the United States…end of story. If there is a subset of people that are easier to vet who we have a better understanding of who they are and what they’re going to do when they come here, they’re going to receive preference, no doubt about it. There are a lot of sad stories around the world, millions and millions of people around the world, it’s heartbreaking. We cannot assume millions and millions of people around the world, no country can, so you have to have a process of deciding who do you prioritize, who do you allow in, we do it all the time, we do it in our immigration system now under our current laws. Unfortunately, it’s primarily based on family connection and not on what they’re going to contribute toward to the society from a a merit standpoint; that should be changed. But that’ll require statutory changes. But the bottom line is this notion that somehow we have to accept anyone who wants to come to
the United States is absurd. No country in the world has an immigration policy like that…”
Kaine: “And no one is arguing that we should.”
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