Secretary of State Marco Rubio has yet another job.
The busy 54-year-old has become President Donald Trump’s go-to guy for just about anything since joining the cabinet, and can now add the title of second-string White House Press Secretary to the lengthy list.
He is already the acting national security adviser and has previously served as the acting administrator of USAID and the acting archivist of the United States. At 3 p.m. on Tuesday, that list will grow as he takes to the podium in the West Wing’s James S. Brady Press Briefing Room, where he will talk to gathered members of the media.
It is the first press briefing since Karoline Leavitt, 28, went on maternity leave ahead of the birth of her second child with husband Nicholas Riccio, 60.
Rubio’s appearance in front of the press was first reported by CBS News Senior White House Correspondent Weijia Jiang.
Politico reported in April that no single person would step in to replace Leavitt while she is away, but that a cadre of familiar faces will step up to speak to the press, including Vice President JD Vance, Cabinet officials, and even potentially Trump.
Politico reported that Leavitt is scheduled to return to her post after giving birth, though there is no confirmation of how long she will be away.
White House press shop business is to be handled by White House Communications Director Steven Cheung, according to Politico’s Playbook.
Rubio, meanwhile, has held so many jobs—now totaling four—that it has become a meme.
An image of him sitting, looking sullen in the Oval Office during a meeting with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky—slumped back, hands on his lap, head forward, eyes glancing right as Trump talks—has become the basis for the mockery.
The memes see people use AI to dress Rubio up in various outfits, including in the ceremonial battle dress of a Venezuelan President in the wake of the abduction of the ousted leader Nicolás Maduro, and in thick winter clothing during Trump’s rhetoric about taking over Greenland.
The joke first appeared in January, in the wake of the attacks on Venezuela, when Trump said from his Mar-a-Lago resort: “We will run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper, and judicious transition.” Rubio, people mused, might have been the man tasked with doing so.
As ICE agents poured into Minnesota and MAGA accused the state of enabling fraud, relations between the White House and Governor Tim Walz reached rock bottom. Soon, a new Rubio meme appeared, wearing hunting gear, supposedly tasked with running the state.
When the English soccer team Manchester United had a bad run of form, memes of Rubio in a Manchester United tracksuit soon surfaced. And, when Israeli strikes killed Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Rubio was pictured on the couch dressed as the supreme leader of Iran.
He was also filmed DJing at a family wedding over the weekend. It was not long until the inevitable happened.
Rubio and Vance are widely touted as the front-runners for the Republican nomination for the 2028 election.
Vance had been regarded as the most likely candidate for some time, but since joining the administration, Trump’s appreciation for Rubio has gone through the roof, regularly praising him despite a bitter primary head-to-head that saw Trump describe him as “Little Marco.”
Rubio “is going to go down as the best secretary of state in the country’s history,” Trump said in March. Rubio, meanwhile, has said he’s not interested in running for the presidency, especially if Vance does.
