Marco Rubio shuts down reporter's Cuba question: 'That's not the way to read it'

Are you sensing any organic effort on the ground in Cuba to actually oust the communist leadership there? That's not the way to read it. Here's the problem with Cuba. Well, you guys asked the Cubans to reach out to the CIA, so I'm wondering if that's delivered any results. Well, I wouldn't tell you if I got a result from the CIA, I mean, but I would, because then those people aren't going to be doing very well. So all I can tell you is this. Here's the problem with Cuba. The regime there is afraid of giving their people any kind of freedom, economic or otherwise, because they like to control them. So what that regime there is trying to do, and they've always done, is they want to have enough economic activity just so that they are like a third world country, but not a fourth world country, but they don't want to lose control over people. They don't mind if the people don't have a lot. They just want to make sure that whatever the people have, they depend on them 100% for it. That's always been the case. How can they grow economically without losing control over their population? That model doesn't work. And all it's led to is millions of people leaving the country of Cuba, including many to the United States. And that has to change because that instability and that failed state that it's created poses a threat to the national security and national interest of the United States. So that's what we're focused on, is how can we get the people of Cuba more freedom, political freedom for certain, because our embargo on Cuba is codified in statute, and it requires political freedom in order to lift it, but also economic freedom. We want the people of Cuba to have what virtually the people of virtually every country in the Western Hemisphere has, and that is the ability to go out and make a living for themselves without depending on the government to provide it for them. Even more troubling is that despite how bad things are in Cuba, There are insiders in that regime that have millions and millions of dollars stashed away in bank accounts all over the world, and that have come to dominate, this is well-documented, military holding company, GAESA, who's been stealing what little they have from the Cuban people. So that also can't continue. So, you know, ultimately our goal is for Cuba to have a better future, and we're going to do everything we can to help. put it on that path but in the end you know it will require them to wake up and realize that there is no future on the path they're on right now and you know this is a very stubborn group of people over there but um we'll keep working on it because it's a priority.