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Published January 26, 2017
This is a rush transcript from "Special Report," April 13, 2015. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
SHANNON BREAM, GUEST ANCHOR: The fourth 2016 contender to make it official -- Senator Marco Rubio. Let's bring in our special expanded panel to talk about this announcement and what it means to the race: Fox News senior political analyst Brit Hume; Jonah Goldberg, senior editor at National Review; Ron Fournier, senior political columnist of National Journal; and syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer.
Brit I'll start with you. This is the fourth roll-out we've seen. What do you make of it?
BRIT HUME, FOX NEWS SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I thought that -- I've always thought Marco Rubio is an impressive young man and I thought he was again tonight. It seemed to me that he touched all the bases we expect a conservative Republican candidate to touch. He certainly made clear his Hispanic roots and gave us a little dose of Spanish, which I think we all suspected was coming.
The story of his upbringing and his roots is the kind of thing that appeals I think in this moment and day and age. The question I think for Marco Rubio is: Can he get a foothold in this race? He's really trying -- vying for space that to some extent or other is occupied already by other candidates. That doesn't mean he can't find his way but it means that he has a challenge.
I mean he's not even the first Cuban-American to enter this race. He's certainly not the first conservative. He's not really the first anything. He doesn't have to be the first. But can he raise enough money? Can he garner enough support to get a chance to make a play, a real play in this race?
I think he has a lot to add. I hope he does, but I think he has a challenge.
BREAM: Well Jonah, at the opposite end of the spectrum of Ronald Reagan talking about his age, Rubio addressed that. You know, some people saying it's not my turn, I should wait addressing the youth as part of the argument. But he also talked about pushing forward, using social technology, getting into the 21st century sounding like he wants to harness the youth as a plus for him.
JONAH GOLDBERG, NATIONAL REVIEW: Yes. I mean this was not a particularly subtle speech. I thought it was a very good speech. But he kicked on all the -- he spent a long time talking about student loans and higher education. I mean he's clearly going for the youth vote. He was almost mercilessly unsubtle in terms of talking about how this isn't the country where just because you're rich and powerful and come from a good family -- I wonder who he could be talking about there -- that doesn't guarantee you the path to power. And I think that's going to be a big part of his message.
Another thing is he's very much running the way Bill Clinton did in 1992 and the way Barack Obama did in 2008: Change election, towards the future, turn a page on the past -- I think it's actually pretty effective.
BREAM: And Ron, there were some who thought that Hillary Clinton by making her announcement yesterday maybe trying to steal some of his thunder, it might overshadow him today. But it sounds like she actually gave him a little bit of ammunition because he used it to go after her directly, linking her to yesterday and saying point blank, yesterday is over.
RON FOURNIER, NATIONAL JOURNAL: Yes. The Clinton campaign is really worried about him -- they really are. And I think Hillary gave him an advantage but so did Obama by these relations with Cuba just on the eve of his vote. Every time he said yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, past, past, past -- he might as well say Clinton, Clinton, Clinton -- Bush, Bush, Bush. This was a not too subtle hit at Jeb Bush as well.
I do agree it was very Clintonesque. I think he's trying to talk about building the bridge to the 21st Century that Clinton promised to do in '96 and never quite got done -- very aspirational, very forward looking, very new generation. Good speech.
BREAM: Charles -- he had one paragraph there that was jam full of all kinds of things: reforming the tax code, regulations, ObamaCare -- doing all kinds of things and tucked in there was modernizing our immigration laws which obviously is something that he took a lot of heat from, from the right back in 2013.
CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER, FOX NEWS POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, he's ticking off all the boxes and he particularly had to tick off the box where if there was any resistance to his candidacy, it has to do with the way he's perceived by some as having gone soft on immigration. But he's changed on that. He's admitted he's changed. He says he learned his lesson.
But this was clearly a speech about old and new. This goes back not just to Clinton in '92 or Obama in '08 -- this is to Kennedy in 1960. Remember in his inaugural address he said the torch has been passed to a new generation. This is generational. He said it openly.
Basically he's saying do you want old or do you want new? He's also implying versus Jeb Bush do you want privileged or unprivileged? And I'm the one. I mean that's his attractiveness. His issue is he's unknown but that gives him a very high upside.
The only question is does he have the skill, the dynamism? Can he give a ringing speech and can he do well in the debates that will give substance to what the promise is. The promise is youth, energy and a new leaf and that's his hope. That's what he talked about tonight.
(CROSSTALK)
FOURNIER: Charles, real quick. I will say I spent the last three or four days in Iowa and I was surprised by how many Republicans in Iowa were saying they were really intrigued and really wanted to hear more from Rubio. He has all kinds of upside in that state.
GOLDBERG: Also you're right he's the second Cuban-American but he's the first Cuban-American who speaks fluent and flawless Spanish, which I think is an important advantage.
BREAM: Brit, you said he doesn't have to be the first at anything. He's now the third senator who's in. And these are all not super- experienced senators.
HUME: Look, I second what I've heard from my colleagues here but you have to wonder whether the United States electorate has the appetite for another rookie senator in the White House. So that -- you know, that is an idea that's sort of been with us in the beginning of this cycle about whether it was time for a governor and whether a governor would have an unmistakable advantage going forward. And Marco Rubio has got that as another challenge that he has to deal with.
BREAM: Yes. For now those governors appear though sniffing around holding their official power dry.
KRAUTHAMMER: On paper he's the classic candidate you'd want against a Clinton because he does -- he's young versus old, but also -- so he negates and he goes after her disadvantage. The fact that there's already a Clinton fatigue even before her campaign starts. But also her advantage is that she's unique in being the first woman. Well, he would be the first Hispanic. So in some ways he sort of neutralizes that, her one advantage, and he would exploit her disadvantage as representing the past.
FOURNIER: To Brit's point, we tend to vote for the exact opposite of the two-term president. He's an awful like Barack Obama on that extent.
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