The Daily Mail reports Marco Rubio hired Nate Hochman for senior State Department posts despite his 2023 dismissal over a video bearing an ADL-listed neo-Nazi symbol.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio brought Hochman into the department as deputy director of its policy planning office and as Rubio’s chief speechwriter, the Daily Mail reported.
The appointment revives a personnel dispute from Ron DeSantis’ 2024 presidential campaign. The Daily Mail said DeSantis’ operation fired Hochman in 2023 after he reshared a video containing the Sonnenrad, also called the black sun.
Hochman now helps develop State Department policy and writes speeches for the nation’s top diplomat. The Daily Mail did not provide the date of his hiring.
State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott defended Hochman in comments published by the Daily Mail, calling him “a trusted and key member of the department who has worked tirelessly to advance the president's foreign policy agenda.”
The Daily Mail described the disputed video as showing a demoralized, Trump-supporting meme figure. It also included the Florida state seal and the Sonnenrad symbol.
The paper said the Anti-Defamation League has catalogued that symbol as a neo-Nazi and white-supremacist emblem. Hochman said he deleted the repost after learning what the symbol meant and alerted his superiors.
Those details matter. A repost can be careless without proving that the person endorses every image inside it. But senior government posts also carry a higher duty to know what message is being spread under one’s name.
Hochman had worked as a speechwriter for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis while DeSantis sought the 2024 Republican nomination. Before that role, the Daily Mail said, Hochman was a Claremont Institute fellow and wrote as a fellow for National Review.
The Daily Mail also reported that Hochman took part in an online conversation with Nick Fuentes, whom the paper described as a white nationalist influencer. The Dispatch later published audio from that exchange.
During the conversation, Hochman told Fuentes: “You've gotten a lot of kids based, and we respect that for sure.” Hochman later said he had been trying to draw Fuentes out.
The Daily Mail quoted Hochman’s later explanation:
“I said some really stupid things, which I don't actually believe, that signaled agreement with Fuentes, even though I couldn't disagree more with his vision of the world,”
That explanation draws a line between Hochman’s words and his beliefs. The words remain part of the public record described by the Daily Mail, while his denial remains his account of what he meant.
After leaving the DeSantis operation, Hochman worked for the conservative group America 2100 and served as a policy adviser to Missouri Republican Sen. Eric Schmitt before joining the State Department, the Daily Mail reported.
Pigott’s defense explains the department’s view of Hochman’s current work. But the Daily Mail did not identify when Rubio hired him, when the Fuentes conversation occurred, or where that conversation took place.
Nor did the paper provide the exact text of the video Hochman reshared. Those gaps limit any final judgment about the full sequence of events, but they do not erase the remarks or the 2023 firing described in its account.
A conservative administration should reject guilt by association. It should also demand candid answers from anyone trusted to shape American policy and pen the nation’s diplomatic message.
Accountability means judging the full record without inventing guilt or waving away conduct that deserves a clear explanation.