Secretary of State Marco Rubio Exposes CBS in Interview

Secretary of State Marco Rubio clashed with CBS News’ Margaret Brennan (“Face the Nation”) after she insanely claimed that Nazi Germany “weaponized” free speech as a catalyst for the horrors of the Holocaust.

With free speech under attack, Rubio quickly responded:

Well, I have to disagree with you. No. I have to disagree with you. . . . Free speech was not used to conduct a genocide. The genocide was conducted by an authoritarian Nazi regime that happened to also be genocidal because they hated Jews and they hated minorities and they had a list of people they hated, but primarily the Jews. . . .

There was no free speech in Nazi Germany. There was none. There was also no opposition in Nazi Germany. They were the sole and only party that governed that country. So that’s not an accurate reflection of history.

Rubio is 100% right. Brennan’s words are “not an accurate reflection of history.” Nazi Germany didn’t allow any free speech or the free press. Perhaps Brennan should retake social studies in high school.

The discussion centered on Vice President J.D. Vance’s recent speech in Munich, where he had strong words for European leaders. He stressed the importance of free speech and warned that “the threat from within” posed the biggest danger to Europe – not Russia or China.

Such a “threat” is the erosion of shared “fundamental values” between America and European allies. Of course, the progressives in Europe pushed back against Vance’s speech, which Brennan saw as an opportunity to attack Vance.

It’s been a string of public humiliations for Brennan’s interactions with Vance after he shut her down in the 2024 Vice President debate and quipped in a recent interview, “I don’t really care, Margaret.” And yet again Brennan has egg on her face after her vendetta to get Vance clearly backfired.

Also, Brennan’s attack illustrates that the media is no longer concerned with historical truth. She is fine with rewriting history to suit her progressive agenda, which is extremely dangerous.

Typically, Americans can’t separate the free speech of citizens from the freedom of the press: They’re in the same clause in the First Amendment! However, the mainstream media seeks to shut down the free speech of political opposition. Brennan should have argued that we need more free speech to counter dangerous rhetoric; rather, she wants to silence it entirely.

ACLJ Senior Counsel for International and Government Affairs Jeff Ballabon is no stranger to CBS News – he used to be its Senior Vice President of Communications – and responded to the controversy:

Like many places in corporate America, [CBS] imported a DEI mentality. A colleague of mine, who was also at CBS at the time I was there, has written about this – because he was there after I left – and that things went from bad to much worse. And on this specific issue, let me be very clear: It’s not only that it wasn’t free speech, but it was worse than that. What Brennan’s really showing is the danger of a media that aligns too closely to a political agenda because that’s what we really had in Hitler’s Germany. We had a media that was not free at all; it was a media that was just in lockstep under the thumb of a totalitarian regime. And they used the media to demonize different peoples, including the Jews, to the point where it became acceptable to exterminate those people. And so it was not free speech. It was a media that was used by a totalitarian regime. And unfortunately, Margaret Brennan gets it exactly reversed, and . . . I’m actually ashamed for CBS News. . . . It goes against everything that any journalism organization should stand for in the U.S.

The ACLJ is a vanguard for free speech. We are currently defending the free speech of a pro-life advocate who was unlawfully prosecuted for sharing his lifesaving message outside an abortion clinic. Sign our petition to join us in defending pro-life advocates from unconstitutional criminal prosecution. Together, we can defend those who are defending the unborn.

Today’s Sekulow broadcast included a full analysis of Secretary of State Marco Rubio schooling CBS News’ Margaret Brennen on the basic history of Nazi Germany.

Watch the full broadcast below: