Here’s How Little Trump’s Pick For Secretary Of State Marco Rubio Is Worth

“He’s a disaster with his credit cards … He certainly lives above his means,” Donald Trump said in 2015 about Florida Senator Marco Rubio, then his opponent in the race for the White House. Rubio dismissed Trump’s claims on Good Morning America, arguing that he only had two debts at the time: his home mortgage and what he owed the country “because of everything it’s made possible for me and my family.” Indeed, he reported no credit card debt in 2014 or 2015—but Trump wasn’t far off. Forbes estimated Rubio’s net worth that year to be just $100,000.

Nine years later, Trump is tapping the Florida senator to be the nation’s top diplomat, his Secretary of State. In that role, assuming he is confirmed, Rubio will make over $200,000 a year, a bump from his $174,000 Senate salary. Even before the pay raise, the 53-year-old’s overall financial picture has improved since 2015. Today, he’s likely worth over $1 million—mostly because of one smart move.

Despite making a healthy salary as a U.S. Senator for 14 years straight, Rubio’s non-real estate assets are worth between just $35,000 to $175,000, according to his latest financial disclosures. He only owns one company’s stock, between $1,000 and $15,000 of Coca-Cola.

That’s even less than what he reported in 2015, when his filings showed between $135,000 and $400,000 in non-real estate wealth. His home, meanwhile, was worth less than he owed on it in 2015, according to Forbes’ estimates.

One reason for the drop in Rubio’s investments’ value could be that three of his four kids have hit college age since 2015. (His third child, Anthony, is a running back on the University of Florida’s football team.)

Luckily, he’s doing better in the real estate market these days. After selling his previous home, a four bedroom, 2,600 square foot house near the airport in West Miami, for $959,000, he bought a slightly smaller Miami residence in 2021 for just under $1 million, borrowing about $850,000 to afford it. The property has since shot up in value; Forbes estimates it to be worth $1.75 million today before debt. The Secretary of State nominee also has a federal pension that’s likely worth six figures. Altogether, it probably adds up to over $1 million in wealth, more than most Americans, but nowhere near as much as plenty of other candidates for administration positions, including Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, financiers Howard Lutnick and Scott Bessent, and WWE cofounder Linda McMahon.

Rubio has come a long way. Born in Miami in 1971 to Cuban immigrants who fled the autocratic Batista regime before the revolution, he credits his interest in public service to his ancestors’ native country’s turn toward communism. After earning a bachelor’s from the University of Florida in 1993 and a law degree from the University of Miami in 1996—taking on tons of student debt in the process—he won a seat on the West Miami City Commission in 1998. Rubio rose rapidly in politics from there, winning a state House seat in 2000, then becoming House majority leader in 2003 and House Speaker in 2006.

In 2010, he won an open Senate seat in a three-way race, beating the independent sitting governor Charlie Crist and a Democratic congressman. His $174,000 salary was quickly put to work: Rubio’s first financial disclosure as a Senator, in 2011, showed mountains of debt, including between $100,000 and $250,000 in student loans, a mortgage of between $250,000 and $500,000, and a home equity loan and mortgage on a Tallahassee rental property each over $100,000. But he caught a break the next year, winning a book advance of $800,000 for his memoir, “An American Son.” It sold nearly 43,000 copies, per data from Circana Bookscan. His student loan debt disappeared from his disclosures.

Books turned out to be a lucrative business: Rubio reported $345,000 in additional income from Penguin Random House in 2013, $30,000 in 2014 and $102,500 in 2015, when he published “American Dreams,” a campaign book to coincide with his presidential run that sold about 14,000 copies. But after that bid flopped—he, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz and the rest of the Republican Party were boxed out by the belittling New York businessman, who nicknamed the much younger Rubio “Little Marco”—the income dried up, and his reported assets dwindled year by year. He reported no additional publishing proceeds until “Decades of Decadence,” an anti-elite treatise, came out in 2023; it has earned him around $100,000 thus far on sales of over 10,000 copies. His wife, who reportedly advises the billionaire Norman Braman’s charity, doesn’t appear to have bolstered their balance sheet much either.

Once a Trump critic, Rubio has become an ally of the president-elect in recent years, echoing his skepticism of additional aid to Ukraine, his hawkish views toward China, Iran, Cuba and Venezuela, and his strong support of Israel. Besides the salary increase, a promotion to Secretary of State would also help Rubio build additional government experience and put him firmly in the inner circle. As former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley discovered, that can be lucrative after leaving office thanks to book deals, six-figure speaking fees and plush private sector positions.