Blog Briefing Room

Rubio holds his nose for New York Times op-ed on Cuba, Obama

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) put aside his repeated criticism of bias at The New York Times in order to pen a Wednesday opinion piece slamming a bigger foe: President Obama.

The presidential candidate blasts Obama’s overtures toward Cuba in his op-ed, arguing that re-establishing economic and diplomatic ties will only bolster the Castro regime and not bring about political reforms.

{mosads}The op-ed comes after Rubio — as recently as Monday — criticized stories in the Times about his spending practices, past traffic tickets and popularity within Cuba.

The Cuban-American lawmaker slammed the newspaper this week for publishing the “Castro regime’s propaganda” on him in a story about how people in Cuba view the 2016 Republican candidate.

Last month his campaign fundraised off a pair of unflattering stories that showed Rubio receiving four traffic tickets and his wife 13 since 1997, and another that mentioned he spent $80,000 on a fishing boat.

Rubio fits in a slight at the newspaper toward the end of his op-ed, saying that Americans tourists “tempted by this newspaper’s idealized version of hip Havana” will travel to Cuba despite political “repression” there.