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US Senator Marco Rubio shared what appears to be a thinly-veiled threat to Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on social media last night.
The Florida senator posted two juxtaposed images on Twitter of the late Libyan leader Muammar Gadaffi, one at the peak of his power and another of him bloody and battered moments before Western-backed rebel fighters sodomised him to death with a bayonet.
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) February 24, 2019
The gruesome tweet was one of a string of similar images of the US’s former enemies and their downfall posted by Mr Rubio, a self-proclaimed “follower of Christ.”
The violent nature of the Gadaffi picture in particular is unnerving, coming from a US senator, especially at a time of the planned US military intervention in Venezuela.
Mark Weisbrot, co-director of left-leaning US think tank Centre for Economic and Policy Research, cast doubt on the senator’s suitability to govern.
“Marco Rubio is a sick individual,” he told his Twitter followers, “who should not have responsibility for anything, much less a Senate seat, or play any role in the foreign policy of the United States.”
Left-wing US journalist and podcaster Abby Martin also condemned Mr Rubio’s actions.
“Today, sitting senator and depraved sadist Marco Rubio tweeted snuff photos and murder threats to the president of a sovereign country.
“In a rational world, this would be grounds for immediate removal from office. Unfortunately, we live in hell.”
Ms Martin accompanied her post with a link to a petition calling for Mr Rubio’s resignation over his assumed promotion of violence. It has already received thousands of signatures.
During the US intervention in Libya in 2011, Mr Rubio was quoted as saying: “When an American president says the guy needs to go, you better make sure that it happens, because your credibility and your stature in the world is on the line.”
He has not explicitly endorsed military action to force out Mr Maduro, but hinted at it last year during an interview with Univision 23. He currently supports President Donald Trump’s administration to consider “all options” for regime change in Venezuela.
Meanwhile, US Vice-President Mike Pence is due to visit Colombia’s capital Bogota to meet right-wing representatives of the Lima Group to discuss military intervention in Venezuela.
