Donald Trump on Saturday retweeted a post suggesting that Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) is not eligible to be president, and on Sunday, the real estate mogul insisted that he didn’t know the Florida senator’s “circumstance.”
“@ResisTyr: Mr.Trump…BOTH Cruz AND Rubio are ineligible to be POTUS! It’s a SLAM DUNK CASE!! Check it! https://t.co/NjqWP0pP6X“
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 20, 2016
During a Sunday interview on ABC’s “This Week,” George Stephanopoulos asked Trump if he really believes that his two main rivals are not eligible to run.
“I think the lawyers have to determine it,” Trump responded. “It was a retweet – not so much with Marco. I’m not really that familiar with Marco’s circumstance.”
“Then why retweet it?” Stephanopoulos asked in response.
“Because I’m not sure. Let people make their own determination,” Trump replied.
Stephanopoulos then asked Trump whether he believes Rubio is eligible.
“I don’t know. I’ve never looked at it, George. Honestly, I’ve never looked at it,” Trump said. “As somebody said, he’s not. And I retweeted it. I have 14 million people between Twitter and Facebook and Instagram, and I retweet things and we start dialogue and it’s very interesting.”
In a January interview on CNN, Trump said it was clear that there was a difference between Rubio and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) when it comes to eligibility.
“He was born here. He was born on the land,” Trump said about Rubio at the time. “Ted was not born on the land, and there’s a very strict reading that you have to be born on the land.”
Rubio responded to Trump on Sunday during an interview on ABC’s “This Week.”
“Look, this is a pattern. This is a game he plays. He says something that’s edgy and outrageous and then the media flocks and covers that and then no one else can get any coverage on anything else,” Rubio said. “And that worked when there were 15 people running for president. It’s not going to work anymore. I’m going to spend zero time on his interpretation of the Constitution with regards to eligibility.”
