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‘Hard Truths’: Brit Hume Explains What Rubio Said To Earn Standing Ovation At Munich

Brit Hume Explains What Rubio Said To Earn Standing Ovation At Munich (Screenshot/Fox News)

Fox News chief political analyst Brit Hume said Monday that Secretary of State Marco Rubio proved why he’s worthy of the job after his blunt remarks at Munich ended with applause from the audience.

Rubio addressed the same Munich audience one year after Vice President JD Vance drew backlash for accusing European leaders of censorship. Rubio delivered his remarks in a more conciliatory tone about shared history and values that officials described as reassuring. Hume said on “Special Report with Bret Baier” that Rubio managed to do what skilled diplomats must, which was to confront allies with uncomfortable realities without alienating them.

“I think the skill or the art of the diplomat is to tell people hard truths and make them like it,” Hume told host Bret Baier. “The message itself, if you look, drill down into it, was not altogether different from the very message that JD Vance, the Vice President, delivered earlier some months back, which was, as you heard the senator from Delaware say, kind of a punch in the mouth.”

Hume said Rubio showed why he serves as the nation’s chief diplomat.

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“This one earned a standing ovation from the audience, as you saw. So I think it suggests that we now can tell why Marco Rubio is our chief diplomat. He displayed some real diplomatic skill in that speech,” Hume added.

Vance told European leaders at the Munich Security Conference in 2025 that the continent has drifted from its commitment to democracy and free speech. He cited examples such as Romania’s canceled elections and the U.K.’s conviction of Adam Smith-Connor for praying outside an abortion clinic. Foreign policy experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation that Vance’s remarks challenged Europe to return to the principles it once championed but now only nominally upholds.

“Vice President Vance sent an important and long overdue message to European leaders: the chief threat to democracy comes not from Russia, but from our own departures from the shared values that long underpinned our Western community. The Biden administration tried to unify the NATO alliance around fear, a shared perception of the Russian threat,” George Beebe, director of grand strategy at the Quincy Institute, told the DCNF.

Rubio told attendees at the Munich Security Conference that the United States will “always be a child of Europe,” pointing to Christopher Columbus’ voyage to the New World, the first English colonies and the influence of Spanish settlers in shaping modern cowboy culture. In his speech, Rubio said the United States and Europe share a deep cultural heritage that continues to bind the two.

“Our first colonies were built by English settlers, to whom we owe not just the language we speak but the whole of our political and legal system. Our frontiers were shaped by Scots-Irish – that proud, hearty clan from the hills of Ulster that gave us Davy Crockett and Mark Twain and Teddy Roosevelt and Neil Armstrong,” Rubio said. “Our great midwestern heartland was built by German farmers and craftsmen who transformed empty plains into a global agricultural powerhouse – and by the way, dramatically upgraded the quality of American beer.”

(Featured Image Media Credit: Screenshot/Fox News)