Donald Trump talks Cuba, oil drilling and Marco Rubio

FEBRUARY 13, 2016 7:29 PM

Donald Trump talks Cuba, oil drilling and Marco Rubio
Front-running Republican candidate shares views with reporter on ride to
airport after USF rally
Discusses Cuba policy, immigration, oil drilling, Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio,
Gov. Rick Scott
BY ADAM C. SMITH
Tampa Bay Times

"Look at the spirit out there!" he gushes as we swing past waving
supporters. "Did you stand there in that room and feel that kind of
response?"

A big part of Trump's appeal is that he speaks like a regular guy
instead of a cautious politician. During a ride to the airport he
invited me to join, the billionaire presidential front-runner is
gracious and warm, every bit the accessible everyman. No press handlers
butting in, no candidate shying away from politically dicey issues and
little skittishness about winging it on matters to which he has paid
scant attention.

It's like talking to your amiable and opinionated uncle in New Jersey
about stuff going on in Florida — but in this case your uncle is poised
to become the Republican presidential nominee.

Trump, 69, repeatedly steers the conversation back to the size of his
crowds and vast support across red and blue states, asking nearly as
many questions as he answers. But during the 16-minute ride to a private
plane awaiting him, he disparages both Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, sounds
skeptical about increased offshore drilling and praises Gov. Rick Scott.

Is it fair that Cubans who arrive in America automatically get legal
status, a path to citzenship and benefits such as Social Security, when
other foreign-born people don't?

"I don't think that's fair. I mean why would that be a fair thing?"
responds Trump, an answer his rivals are likely to remind him of when
campaigning in Miami-Dade County, where thousands of residents fled
political persecution in Cuba. "I don't think it would be fair. You know
we have a system now for bringing people into the country, and what we
should be doing is we should be bringing people who are terrific people
who have terrific records of achievement, accomplishment. . . . You have
people that have been in the system for years [waiting to immigrate to
America], and it's very unfair when people who just walk across the
border, and you have other people that do it legally."

The so-called wet-foot, dry-foot policy that allows Cubans to stay if
they set foot on U.S. soil faces growing skepticism now that the Obama
administration is normalizing relations with Cuba.

Trump says he supports those efforts, and expanding economic ties
between the countries (unlike Bush, Rubio and Ted Cruz), but he doubts
the current administration's ability to strike a good-enough deal. Asked
for specifics, he notes that Cuban officials are talking about reparations.

"You don't want to make a deal and get sued two days later. You don't
want to make a deal, and all of a sudden you're in court being sued for
$30 billion."

I ask about proposals in Congress that would expand offshore oil
drilling, including one that would allow drilling 50 miles from
Florida's coast rather than the current 125-mile restriction.

"What's the view in Florida? Are people in favor of that?" he asks,
questioning whether the current proposal is for the Atlantic Ocean.

For the Gulf of Mexico mostly, I say, explaining that there's more
support for expanded drilling in inland Florida, and much more
opposition along Florida's coasts.

"They've already got plenty in the Gulf. . . . It would be a little bit
of a shame [to expand drilling closer to Florida], because there's so
much fracking and there's so much oil that we have now that we never
thought possible," Trump says. "That's an issue I'd absolutely study and
do the right thing."

Trump spent part of his speech at USF criticizing "gutless" Bush. Why is
he so tough on Bush day after day but no longer raises questions about
Rubio's controversial use of a state GOP credit card, as he used to?
Might Rubio be an attractive running mate for Trump?

He asks about the credit cards.

"So he got caught and after he gets caught, he says, 'Oh, I'll pay you
back,' right?"

Rubio had to pay back several thousand dollars to the state party after
the Tampa Bay Times and Miami Herald revealed that Rubio had
double-billed the state GOP and Florida taxpayers for flights. But much
of the controversy involved questions about whether Rubio charged the
state party for many thousands of dollars for supposed political
expenses that were actually personal expenses, I explain. Party leaders
said he was never supposed to use the card for personal use, though
Rubio did it routinely and said he later paid for those expenses himself.

"I've been hearing about this for a long time, I know a lot of people
who are very unhappy with it. And there are those that say he got
caught, and after he got caught he said, 'Oh I'd love to pay you back.'
But that's not the way the system works."

He says Rubio has been "badly hurt" by his much-mocked debate
performance in New Hampshire, and disagrees when I suggest Rubio could
recover in South Carolina.

As for Bush, "I'm ripping into Jeb because he spent $20 million on
negative ads on me. He's spending money on me and saying, like a baby,
'Oh look, I said something bad about Donald Trump. That means I have so
much courage.' "

Gov. Scott, on the other hand, is an excellent friend, he says. Trump
and the governor speak about once a month.

"He's very underrated. I don't think he gets a fair shake. He should get
more kudos than he's gotten."

Trump supports Scott opposing Medicaid expansion in Florida, because
states that accept that funding only strengthen Obamacare.

Does he agree with Scott's decision to reject $2.4 billion in federal
money for a high-speed rail system between Tampa and Orlando?

"It was fine," he says. "[The governor] felt you have highways where the
car gets there faster than the train."

I remind him how he used to be an enthusiastic supporter of former Gov.
Charlie Crist, hosting fundraising events for him in New York and at his
Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach (which, Trump notes, was at one point
expected to serve as the Southern White House).

I supported Crist when he was a Republican, Trump says.

"It looked like he was a super politician, and he turned out to be a dud."

I wonder what he thinks of St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman joking
that he was banning Trump from the city after Trump called for a
temporary ban on Muslims entering the country. Never heard about it,
Trump says.

"You can say what you want, you can be politically correct, but there's
something going on," he said of those controversial Muslim comments.
"You saw in the New Hampshire polls, 68 percent agree with me on that
subject."

He is still fired up from his Tampa rally.

"You've never seen a political rally like that. I've had the biggest
reporters, from The New York Times, say there's no such thing like that
that's ever existed. Ever existed!"

The SUV pulls up to a private plane at Tampa Executive Airport.

Write something nice, he exhorts, and then takes off.

Source: Donald Trump talks Cuba, oil drilling and Marco Rubio | Miami
Herald -
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article60274061.html