Trump likely to appoint US Senator Marco Rubio as top US diplomat: reports

U.S. Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, speaks during the second day of the 2024 Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wis., July 16. AFP-Yonhap

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump is expected to appoint U.S. Senator Marco Rubio as his first secretary of state under his second term, news reports have said.

Trump has picked the Florida-based Republican to take on the job as the top American diplomat, according to news reports by Reuters and the New York Times, citing unidentified sources.

Known for his hawkish stance on countries like China, Iran and Cuba, Rubio, if formally appointed, is largely expected to reinforce his hard-line position on North Korea as well.

In a 2017 interview with CBS, the senator said the United States should do "whatever it takes" to stop the North from acquiring capabilities to strike the U.S. mainland with a nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile.

"We must do almost whatever it takes, just about anything, to prevent Kim Jong-un from acquiring the nuclear capability he can deliver against the mainland of the United States of America," Rubio said.

Rubio is also known to have stressed the need for close coordination with South Korea on North Korean and Korean Peninsula issues. In 2009, Rubio visited the Demilitarized Zone separating the two Koreas during his trip to Seoul.

Rubio sits on the Senate Intelligence Committee and the Foreign Relations Committee. (Yonhap)