Secretary of State Marco Rubio downplayed a New York Times report that Russia plans to give more support to Iran against the U.S. and said the CIA director’s trip to Moscow last week was “routine,” during an interview with FNC’s Brian Kilmeade.

BRIAN KILMEADE: So, Vladimir Putin says this to Iran: During these difficult times, we’re trying to provide you with the assistance you need. We have discussed this with you and are supplying you with the necessary goods. We always thought they were giving – it seems as though they’re giving satellite coordinates to help kill our people – but now we have the Russians saying directly, We’re helping you out. MARCO RUBIO: Yeah. Well, in the case, unfortunately, of Iran, we’re not aligned with the Russians and the Russian system in terms of their view of the situation. Obviously, Russia has their own hands full with Ukraine and that effort there. But I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: nothing that anyone is providing Iran is in any way impeding our ability to act as necessary to protect the United States. That said, it is clear that, in the case of what Iran is doing, we are not necessarily fully aligned with the Russian position on it. But Russia’s got – and Putin’s got – his own set of problems that I think take up the majority of his time and focus, which is the war with Ukraine and, frankly, the impacts that these Ukrainian strikes are having on the Russian economy in combination with sanctions. BRIAN KILMEADE: I’ve talked to Secretary Rubio – obviously, Mr. Secretary, appreciate your time. So, when you talk about John Ratcliffe, he had a 72-hour mission, six hours on the ground in Russia. We don’t know exactly what he discussed, but I imagine it was important. Some have said it was a proposal to have a trilateral meeting between President Trump, President Zelenskyy, and President Putin, as well as warning them, letting them know the reality on the ground is you’re not doing very well. Is there anything you could share with the country about what that meeting was about? MARCO RUBIO: Yeah, I’ve seen those reports, and I don’t know where those are coming from, because nobody who has any knowledge of that meeting – it’s a very small handful of people – and none of them have talked to the press. So this is stuff they’re getting secondhand and reporting on. But let me just say that that trip was primarily a routine one. It is not unprecedented. Despite whatever differences we may have geopolitically, the United States does have to be able to communicate with Russia from a very practical perspective. They have, you know, the second-largest nuclear stockpile in the world. The United States has to be able to communicate with them. I’ve met with the foreign minister. We’ve talked to their foreign ministry. We’re engaged with them in that regard. And I think for a long period of time there’s been exchanges between our respective intelligence communities, including our Department of War, and deconfliction and things of this nature. This has always existed. So his visit there was largely routine in that sense of just establishing and continuing to build these intel-to-intel communication channels, because those things can prove useful in a time of crisis or conflict. I mean, this is not unusual. It’s occurred under other administrations as well. But there really – it wasn’t part of any sort of broader initiative other than, you know, continuing to establish those intel-to-intel channels that can prove useful in any particular contingency or crisis situation.
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