Sen. Marco Rubio on what he's looking for in 2016

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," May 13, 2014. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: Welcome back to "Hannity." A lot of 2016 buzz has been surrounding my next guest as of late, and after he said in an interview that he's qualified to be president. So will he make a run for the White House?

Joining me now, the man himself, Florida senator Marco Rubio. Senator -- I see -- I see the smiles. The smile tells me you're going to give me the answer that I want. I'm wasting my time, right?

SEN. MARCO RUBIO, R-FLA.: Yes. Well, first of all, thanks for having me back, Sean. It's not time yet.

HANNITY: But you know, it's very funny to me -- I actually was trying to wrack my brain. I haven't had time to Google this yet. But I don't remember many people asking Barack Obama that question, do you?

RUBIO: No, I don't. But again, look, I think it's an interesting question. As I said, I'm a U.S. Senator now. I'm focused on this job. I'll have a decision to make at the end of the year.

But your point is well taken. I certainly would line up my resume against his at this stage in his career, having served in state government. It's not a full-time job, but I did serve in state government, speaker of the house, majority leader, majority whip there. I actually served two years on a local government, as well.

So -- but as I said, I -- we -- our Republican Party by and large has a number of people, including many who don't want to run for president, that are much more qualified to hold that office than the man who's there now.

HANNITY: Yes. Well, and I would add you to the list. There is a slight little conflict of interest, thought. I mean, you and Jeb Bush are very close. Would it impact your decision if he ran? And what are your thoughts about him running?

RUBIO: Well, you're right about the fact that we've worked together for many years. I'm a big admirer of his. I think he'd be a formidable candidate and a strong one. But as I said, when someone thinks about running for something like that, the presidency of the United States, I don't think you do so by taking into account other people's decisions. I think you have to decide whether that's where you want to serve the country and whether you have a concrete vision for the future and ideas about how to get the country there. And I bet you he would tell you the exact same thing.

HANNITY: Yes. You know, it was interesting, in the comments that you made, it was kind of unique and a little bit refreshing to me. You said that if you decide to run, you're all in. You don't go with the plan B, Oh, I'll also run for the Senate at the same time.

RUBIO: Yes, I don't think the decision one makes is, I want to be in office, and if that's the presidency, great, and if not, then I'll keep what I have. I think when you decide to run for president it's because you are so determined to serve the country in that role that that's all you're focused on, so -- at least for me. I don't criticize anyone else. But for me, if that's the decision we come to at the end of this year or early next year, it'll be about that. It won't be about creating a plan B.

HANNITY: You know, one of the things that I've been really interested about is the fact that the top 10 states for growth and opportunity by 500 CEOs in the country, they're all red state governors. You know, it's your state of Florida second. Texas is number one. You got Ohio, John Kasich. You got Scott Walker's state. You got Louisiana. Louisiana and Wisconsin in particular have made huge leaps since they've elected conservative governors.

I've been a little disappointed in this sense, that -- that in Washington, Republicans have not rallied around a consensus-inspiring agenda. For example, balancing the budget, an alternative to ObamaCare, energy, school choice, securing the borders. Those five things. Why is there no consensus plan?

RUBIO: Well, that's a good question. I think part of it is because we haven't had enough public figures that are actually running about what we're going to do. I think it's pretty clear what we're against, and the things that we're against are bad things that we need to stop from happening.

But I also think it's important for us to outline this is what we will do if we have -- if you put us in charge of government. And primarily, that means positioning this country to have another American century.

That's not where we're headed right now. America is becoming a more difficult place to innovate, a more difficult place to invest, having a big education system that the Democrats want to keep pouring money into that's failing our students from K through 12 all the way to universities. We've become an unfriendly climate, and a growing number of companies don't want to invest here and create jobs here because it's more expensive to do it here because of regulations and taxes and anti-business rhetoric from government.

So these are the sorts of things that Republicans have to go to people and say, We recognize that you're hurting and you're insecure. It's clear after the last six years that big government doesn't solve it, and in fact, makes it worse. Here's what we would do instead.

HANNITY: What would be your five -- top five agenda items? And I'm not trying to put you on the spot, but I have mine and I'm just curious what yours are.

RUBIO: Well, I think we have a number of things we have to accomplish. I think first and foremost is to keep our country safe. And as I've said repeatedly, the best way to ensure that our military will never have to go to war is to have a military that could win any war. So I think for federal government purposes, it's number one obligation is to keep our country safe, and that means to have an unquestioned advantage over anybody else when it comes to national security.

Number two, I think we've got to grow our economy. It has to grow much faster and more robustly than it's doing now. And of course, that entails having higher education system that actually capacitates (ph) people to go to work, teaches them skills that actually will allow them get a job. It means making America the best place in the world to invest. It makes -- it means making America the best country in the world to innovate. It means allowing us to have access to markets in a way that's fair. That means selling more of our products like natural oil and -- like natural gas and oil, these sorts of things. I think that's critically important for our future.

You touched on a moment ago about immigration. I know it's a controversial issue. But as part of that, you know, as a sovereign country, we have a right to enforce our laws. We don't have a mechanism to do that. And I think our legal immigration system needs to be changed so that it's merit-based, based on economic realities, not simply the old, outdated system we have now, which is only about family reunification. Those are important concepts, and they're interrelated, by the way.

HANNITY: How much time -- and I guess there's some internal debate. I don't like the fact that we're being lied to. I feel like we've been lied to and manipulated on Benghazi, lied to about rogue agents in Cincinnati as it relates to the IRS, intimidating, harassing and trying to silence opposition voices. I feel like Americans were lied to about keeping their plan, their doctor and saving money.

How far -- how much of an issue is that for you that, you know, we're not being told the truth on a regular basis now by our own government?

RUBIO: Well, just as an issue of character, it's a big deal because if you've got leaders that are willing to mislead the public, that tells you a lot about where they want to take our country.

But here's what's more telling to me. And you see this in the left in general, and in this administration in specific. They view the country as children and that they have the medicine that we need to take to make us better, even if we don't like it.

And so even if they have to lie to us about what we're taking, even they have to lie to us about how it would work, they're going to make us do it because they know what's right for us better than we know what's right for us.

And so on issue after issue, whether it's the impact of "Obama care" or even on foreign policy issues, they won't level with the American people because if they did, they could never gain our support. And the health care law's a perfect example of it. If you had told Americans that you were going to disrupt the entire health care industry in exchange for what we've seen happen in return, they would never take it up. There are more people are worse off after ObamaCare than there are better off. That's not something they would ever admit to when they were proposing this because if we knew the truth it would never even have passed the Democratic congress.

HANNITY: Good to see you, senator, appreciate you being with us, as always.

RUBIO: Thank you.

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