Eight Democrats with barely concealed 2028 ambitions descended on the Munich Security Conference this past weekend, hoping to burnish their foreign policy credentials on European soil. What they got instead was a masterclass in how not to audition for Commander-in-Chief.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, meanwhile, delivered a highly anticipated address that drew positive reviews and applause, striking a tone of firmness and alliance in equal measure. The contrast was not subtle.
According to Fox News, the roster alone told the story. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Gov. Gavin Newsom, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Sens. Ruben Gallego, Mark Kelly, Chris Murphy, and Elissa Slotkin, plus former Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo. All gathered in Munich. All positioning. Longtime Democrat strategist Joe Caiazzo said the quiet part plainly:
"Speaking in Munich serves to bolster their foreign affairs credentials, especially under the backdrop of the looming 2028 presidential campaign."
Fair enough. Politicians travel to look serious. The problem is that several of them showed up and did the opposite.
Ocasio-Cortez, the four-term progressive champion from New York, took the stage on a panel alongside Whitmer and U.S. Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker. When asked whether the United States should send troops to defend Taiwan from a possible Chinese invasion, she appeared to stall for nearly 20 seconds before offering that the U.S. should try to avoid reaching a clash with China over Taiwan.
Twenty seconds of silence on a yes-or-no question about the most consequential military flashpoint on the planet. At a security conference. In front of an international audience.
Conservative radio host and Fox News contributor Hugh Hewitt did not mince words:
"AOC is like a parade of clichés. A model U.N. student that didn't get enough sleep."
Even a veteran Democratic strategist, who asked to remain anonymous to speak more freely, conceded the damage:
"It is abundantly clear that AOC is not ready for prime time given her remarks in Europe."
When your own side's operatives are whispering that to reporters, the trip did not go as planned. Her broader remarks at the conference were no sharper. Ocasio-Cortez told the audience:
"We are seeing our presidential administration tear apart the transatlantic partnership, rip up every democratic norm. I think many of us are here to say we are here, and we are ready for the next chapter, not to have the world turn to isolation, but to deepen our partnership … and increase our commitment to integrity to our values."
This is the kind of rhetoric that sounds meaningful in a college lecture hall and evaporates the moment anyone asks a specific question. Like, say, whether you'd defend Taiwan.
Whitmer, the term-limited governor of the key Great Lakes battleground state, took a notably different approach. She acknowledged that Ocasio-Cortez and Ambassador Whitaker were "much more steeped in foreign policy than a governor is." Points for honesty. But when pressed on what victory would look like for Ukraine, her answer landed somewhere between vague and aspirational:
"Ukraine's independence, keeping their land mass and having the support of all of the allies, I think, is the goal."
That's not a foreign policy position. It's a hope dressed up as a sentence.
Governor Gavin Newsom, never one to let a microphone go to waste, used Munich as a stage to deliver his sharpest attacks on the president. Speaking during a climate change discussion on Friday, he called Trump's climate policy "doubling down on stupid" and declared:
"Never in the history of the United States of America has there been a more destructive president than the current occupant of the White House in Washington, D.C. Donald Trump is trying to turn back the clock."
He also assured the European audience that "Donald Trump is temporary. He'll be gone in three years."
Something is clarifying about watching a governor who presides over rampant homelessness, an exodus of residents, and recurring infrastructure failures fly to Germany to lecture an international audience about destructive leadership. Newsom wasn't building foreign policy credentials in Munich. He was running a campaign commercial on someone else's stage.
Against that backdrop, Rubio's address landed with a very different weight. Just a month after President Trump delivered tough remarks at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the Secretary of State arrived in Munich with a message calibrated to complement, not contradict, the administration's posture. He offered firmness on substance and warmth on partnership:
"In a time of headlines heralding the end of the trans-Atlantic era, let it be known and clear to all that this is neither our goal nor our wish, because for us Americans, our home may be in the Western Hemisphere, but we will always be a child of Europe."
"The United States and Europe, we belong together."
Rubio didn't shy from hard truths either, criticizing European nations over immigration and their climate agenda, and taking aim at the United Nations for playing "virtually no role" in peace efforts in Ukraine and Gaza. He managed to be direct without being adversarial. That's diplomacy.
Republican strategist and State Department veteran Matt Mowers framed Rubio's speech alongside Vice President JD Vance's address at the same conference the prior year, calling them "the dynamic duo" and explaining the strategic sequencing:
"You needed more of a wrecking ball last year to wake everyone up."
"You have someone who can try to bring together more unity based upon a shared framework. But I think the two of them together have done a great job at really explaining what a U.S.-European relationship can look like for the 21st century."
Vance delivered the shock. Rubio delivered the handshake. Both served a purpose, and both advanced the same vision of an alliance built on mutual accountability rather than American subsidy.
What Munich revealed is a Democratic field that confuses volume with vision. Ocasio-Cortez froze on the most predictable question a security conference could throw at her. Newsom treated foreign policy as a venue for domestic point-scoring. Whitmer was at least self-aware enough to hedge.
Mowers offered the blunt Republican assessment:
"What we saw on the Democratic side were a bunch of folks who were not ready for prime time. I think the American people are going to look at the circus group that showed up there and wonder if they can trust any of them to be in a position of power and lead America forward."
Even Caiazzo, the Democrat strategist, acknowledged the open question of whether any of these figures can articulate a coherent foreign policy vision:
"It's unclear which strategy is going to work, but I think regardless of who is successful, they will need a clear and cogent foreign policy to return our position at the global table."
That's a generous way of saying none of them demonstrated one this weekend.
Hewitt put the finest point on it: "I think they hurt themselves badly."
The irony is that these Democrats flew to Munich to project seriousness and competence on the world stage. Rubio didn't have to project anything. He just did the job.