Secretary of State Marco Rubio reassured Europe in his Saturday remarks at a national security conference in Germany that the U.S. cares “deeply” about the continent’s wellbeing despite recent disagreements.
Rubio highlighted the U.S. and Europe’s shared history and culture while addressing 62nd Annual Munich Security Conference. He also stated the two allies’ destinies are “intertwined” and that “the fate of Europe will never be irrelevant to” the U.S.
The secretary’s apparent olive branch to Europe — which has historically been the region most allied with America’s interests — comes as tensions between the two powers increased amid President Donald Trump’s quest to acquire Greenland, currently a territory of Denmark. It also appears to mark a sharp contrast to a more critical message a newly inaugurated Vice President JD Vance delivered at the annual national security conference in 2025.
“For the United States and Europe, we belong together. America was founded 250 years ago, but the roots began here on this continent [Europe] long before,” Rubio said during his speech. “We are part of one civilization – Western civilization. We are bound to one another by the deepest bonds that nations could share, forged by centuries of shared history, Christian faith, culture, heritage, language, ancestry, and the sacrifices our forefathers made together for the common civilization to which we have fallen heir.”
“And so this is why we Americans may sometimes come off as a little direct and urgent in our counsel. This is why President Trump demands seriousness and reciprocity from our friends here in Europe,” the secretary of state continued. “The reason why, my friends, is because we care deeply. We care deeply about your future and ours.”
“And if at times we disagree, our disagreements come from our profound sense of concern about a Europe with which we are connected – not just economically, not just militarily,” he added. “We are connected spiritually and we are connected culturally. We want Europe to be strong. We believe that Europe must survive, because the two great wars of the last century serve for us as history’s constant reminder that ultimately, our destiny is and will always be intertwined with yours, because we know that the fate of Europe will never be irrelevant to our own.”
Rubio went on to list various historical and cultural achievements of Europe, including the continent being the birthplace of classical liberalism, “the rule of law, the universities, and the scientific revolution,” as well as its profound contributions to classical art, literature, classical music, and rock music.
The secretary also stressed the need for both the U.S. and Europe to “gain control of our national borders,” calling mass migration “a crisis which is transforming and destabilizing societies all across the West.”
“Controlling who and how many people enter our countries, this is not an expression of xenophobia. It is not hate. It is a fundamental act of national sovereignty,” he said. “And the failure to do so is not just an abdication of one of our most basic duties owed to our people. It is an urgent threat to the fabric of our societies and the survival of our civilization itself.”
He also called to reform “global institutions,” such as the United Nations.
“[W]e do not want our allies to be weak, because that makes us weaker. We want allies who can defend themselves so that no adversary will ever be tempted to test our collective strength,” Rubio stated.
We do not want allies shackled by guilt and shame.
Should the U.S. continue its close ties with Europe as emphasized by Secretary Rubio?We want allies who are proud of their culture and heritage and are willing to help us defend it. pic.twitter.com/IOKg9n1UNM
— Secretary Marco Rubio (@SecRubio) February 14, 2026
“This is why we do not want our allies to be shackled by guilt and shame. We want allies who are proud of their culture and of their heritage, who understand that we are heirs to the same great and noble civilization, and who, together with us, are willing and able to defend it,” he emphasized.
“It will be good. I think it will be well received. We’ll see,” Rubio told reporters Thursday at Maryland’s Joint Base Andrews when asked what his message was going to be at the Munich conference.
A reporter then pressed the secretary of state on what he thought Europeans were “hoping to hear” from his Saturday speech, asking whether the continent’s nations were looking for a message which was “more conciliatory” than remarks previously delivered there by Vance.
“I think they want— honestly, they want to know where we’re going, where we’d like to go, where we’d like to go with them,” Rubio answered. “So that’s our hope.”
“The world is changing very fast right in front of us. The old world is gone — frankly, the world that I grew up in — and we live in a new era in geopolitics, and it’s going to require all of us to sort of reexamine what that looks like and what our role is going to be,” the secretary added in his Thursday remarks to reporters. “And it’s— we’ve had many of these conversations in private with many of our allies, and they are our allies, and we need to continue to have those conversations.”
Vice President Vance addressed the 61st Annual Munich Security Conference on Feb. 14, 2025, delivering a blistering rebuke of European government censorship of dissenting political expression.
“For years, we’ve been told that everything we fund and support is in the name of our shared democratic values. Everything from Ukraine policy to digital censorship is built as a defense of democracy,” Vance said in his 2025 speech which sent shockwaves throughout the international geopolitical community.
“But when we see European courts canceling elections and senior officials threatening to cancel others, we ought to ask ourselves whether we are holding ourselves to an appropriately high standard,” Vance said just over three weeks after he had taken office. “And I say ‘ourselves’ because I fundamentally believe we are on the same team. We must do more than talk about democratic values, we must live them.”
Vance is not attending the 2026 Munich Security Conference, leaving Rubio as the primary U.S. representative there. Rubio was also in attendance at the 2025 conference, his first as secretary of state.
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