Rubio visiting Orban two months ahead of key election after meeting with Slovakian leader
Taking advantage of his time in Europe after the Munich Security Conference, US secretary of state Marco Rubio is visiting Slovakia and Hungary – two countries with strong ties to Donald Trump.
The State Department announced Rubio will use the trip to discuss energy cooperation and bilateral issues, including NATO commitments.
“These are countries that are very strong with us, very cooperative with the United States, work very closely with us, and it’s a good opportunity to go see them and two countries I’ve never been in,” Rubio told reporters before leaving for Munich.
Rubio doubles his time as Trump’s national security adviser and will meet in Bratislava today with Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, who met with the US president last month in Florida.
The US secretary of state will meet with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who is friendly with Vladimir Putin and has often been at odds with the EU’s approach to Ukraine and Russia.
Orban has been in a back-and-forth online battle with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, only posting yesterday that the Ukrainian president’s speech “is precisely why you cannot become a member of the European Union”.
He is trailing in most of the polls ahead of an election in April, but Rubio said Trump was “very supportive of him”.
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