An investigation by The Washington Post revealed that Secretary of State Marco Rubio used government aircraft valued at over 1.2 million dollars to attend University of Florida football games, where his son plays.
The report by journalists Noah White and Rick Maese details that Rubio has made at least 23 trips to Gainesville —home of the university— since he took office in January 2025, and that he attended a minimum of ten Florida Gators games over the last two seasons.
The State Department classified 15 of those trips as "exclusively personal," with an approximate cost of $770,600. Another seven combined personal and official purposes, totaling nearly $443,900 additional. The most commonly used aircraft were the Gulfstream C-37A and C-37B, billed at about $9,100 per hour, although a Boeing C-32A was used for three journeys, with a rate of around $18,600 per hour.
Federal regulations prohibit the Secretary of State from flying on commercial airlines for security reasons, similar to the restrictions placed on the Secretary of Defense and the directors of the FBI and CIA. The law only requires reimbursement to the treasury for the equivalent of a coach class ticket, a minimal fraction of the actual cost. The Post estimated that this reimbursement would be around $18,000 for strictly personal travel, just 1.5% of the total, although neither Rubio nor the State Department disclosed the actual amount paid.
An expert in governmental ethics consulted by the newspaper stated that the trips "comply with federal regulations," but "raise a question about the management of public funds." Former officials from the State Department told the Post that Rubio's personal travel far exceeds that of his predecessors in the position.
The most striking episode occurred on October 31, when Rubio took advantage of his attendance at the G20 foreign ministers' meeting in Atlanta to take several of his counterparts to the game between Florida and Georgia at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium, where Georgia won 27-8. Among the guests were representatives from Argentina, Mexico, Australia, the United Kingdom, India, the European Union, and Poland.
The son of the Secretary of State, Anthony Rubio, has held the position of running back for the Florida Gators since 2023, although his participation has been minimal: in four seasons, he has played only four games.
Rubio, a graduate of the University of Florida in 1993 and a long-time fan of the Gators even before his son joined the team, defended the trips without reservation: “I have attended and will continue to try to make it to as many events that are important to me personally and to my family as possible,” he said to the Post.
The official response came swiftly. The Under Secretary of State for Global Public Affairs, Dylan Johnson, described the report as "stupid" on the social media platform X and argued that "the article from the Post itself quotes experts stating that this is not news and that there is nothing here."
The defense of the Department of State in response to the report was also echoed among Rubio's allies. Former White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote on X: "The Washington Post confirms that Secretary Rubio is a great father."
Rubio is among the potential Republican candidates for the presidency in 2028, adding a political dimension to the controversy surrounding the use of public funds for his personal travel.
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