Yesterday in Athens, Secretary of State Marco Rubio delivered the most outstanding speech of anyone in the Trump administration since the President was reelected in 2024.
With the Acropolis and Parthenon behind him as the sun was setting — a backdrop so picturesque that one could be forgiven for thinking it was AI or a green screen — in my opinion, he might have given one of the greatest political speeches of the 21st Century.
If you have not had a chance to watch or listen to it, the full speech, worthy of Demosthenes himself, is below:
Secretary of State Marco Rubio delivers a speech for the ages from the Acropolis in Athens, Greece. Listen to the entire speech to understand the dangers the West faces. It's critical to our survival. https://t.co/MsK89yINmu
— Ryan Saavedra (@RyanSaavedra) October 7, 2026
I won't rehash every point Rubio made, but his overall theme that the West is at an inflection point, and how we must look to the men who stood firm thousands of years ago in the same spot where he was now standing, could not have come at a more urgent time.
The West is not facing decline because we are confronted by a superior enemy. The West faces atrophy because of our own weakness. The men of ancient Greece defended the Acropolis with their lives. In America, and across Western Europe, many tore down our historical monuments willingly, even eagerly and with a religious fervor.
Rubio also aimed at reclaiming nationalism, which he says has become a dirty word among certain Westerners and Americans (and we all know who they are). National pride and national strength are not only an unequivocal good, but they are also essential to civilizational survival. The Greeks knew this too, long ago, as did the Founding Fathers of America.
Finally, and importantly, Rubio was purposeful in not speaking down to his audience. He was speaking to them, citing the many influences of ancient Greece and Rome that live on today in America. We must reclaim heroism, pride, and duty, all of which the ancient Greeks taught us. The alternative is a West that no longer recognizably exists.
This last point in particular struck me as I was watching Rubio speak. For decades, we have been told, again by the left, that we are "ugly Americans," that the world hates us for these same vital qualities that the Secretary of State outlined. (Never mind that the World Cup last summer demonstrated how amazed Europeans are by America and how much they love our country and our people.)
But Rubio was not mocking Europe for not having those qualities. He was pleading with them to pick them back up and fulfill the legacy of their forebears. Do NOT be ashamed of all our nations have given to the world, over centuries in the case of America, but over millennia when it comes to Greece. And do not back down to anyone who would demand that you forsake those values.
It was reminiscent of Vice President JD Vance's 2025 speech at the Munich Security Conference, where he criticized the EU for abandoning Western principles such as free speech.
JD Vance went to the Munich Security Conference and roasted the entire continent of Europe for being petty tyrants and criminalizing freedom of speech, including a British man arrested for praying at an abortion clinic. https://t.co/o51VoWZ6Mr
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) February 14, 2025
But while Vance may have been the stick, here Rubio (who also delivered a piece de resistance in Munich earlier this year) acted as the carrot.
We share a heritage with Greece and all other European nations. We must embrace it — together — or invaders will surely erase it.
By contrast, let's look at how Democrats act when they are speaking overseas. At the same Munich Security Conference where Rubio entreated his Western counterparts to join us, AOC called our own government, in which she serves, "authoritarian." Kamala Harris went to Europe to call Trump a "dictator" (without, of course, providing any legitimate examples of how he is one). Barack Obama went to London in 2025 to call the President a racist. Because, of course, he did. It's the only card he has left to play. In a hilarious case of projection, Bernie Sanders appeared with Brazilian President Lula just last month to accuse the US of "destabilization" in the South American nation. (That one was in New York, but at the UN, so it might as well have been overseas.)
I could go on for 10 more paragraphs and still not run out of examples (I haven't even mentioned the Clintons), but you get the point.
Which is the ugly American? Secretary of State Rubio, for exhorting Europe to take pride in their contributions to the world, or every Democrat leader in America who has completely forgotten the phrase, "politics stops at the water's edge"?
Back in the George W. Bush administration, the Dixie Chicks (or whatever they call themselves now) caused an uproar when they trashed our President in Europe over the Iraq War. It was huge news at the time, mainly because it was previously unheard of. Today? It wouldn't even cause a ripple, except in conservative circles on X, because EVERY Democrat now trashes America, especially while in a foreign country.
Think of all of the leftist performers who have been infected with the social contagion of shouting "F ICE!" and "Free Palestine!", whether they are playing in the U.S. or abroad. And think of the hysteria they created when one arena owner didn't want terrorist sympathizer Macklemore to play at his stadium.
Hating and denouncing America has never been more en vogue among Democrats than it is today.
The right does not do this. Yes, we complained loudly and daily about our last (alleged) President here at home. But there are virtually no examples of prominent Republican leaders traveling to another country to blast Joe Biden for his corruption and mental decline during his administration.
Yesterday, Marco Rubio delivered an impassioned plea to Greece and the rest of Europe to take up the mantle of their legacy, to join the United States in being strong, proud of who we are, and willing to defend our nations and values to the death.
Meanwhile, Mayor Zohran Mamdani spent yesterday deliberately spitting in the faces of the victims of the October 7 terrorist attack (and even with that, his America-hating mob still came after him).
So, I ask again the question everyone already knows the answer to: Who are these ugly Americans we always keep hearing about?
But if anyone needs a clue about the answer, it's one word — Blue.
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