Rubio Denies He’s Blaming Bill Clinton for 9/11

RUSH TRANSCRIPT: 
TODD: "I want to move to the debate. You said in response to a heated exchange between Jeb Bush and Donald Trump on 9/11, this is what you said about 9/11. And I want to ask you about it on the other side."
RUBIO: "The world trade center came down because Bill Clinton didn’t kill Osama bin Laden when he had the chance to kill him."
TODD: "That’s a big charge. I know Bill Clinton has said it is one of his regrets, but he did make an attempt to go after him. But you believe that is a direct result that basically bill Clinton’s failure led to 9/11?"
RUBIO: "Well, I believe that if Osama bin Laden had been killed, Al Qaeda as an organization would not have grown to the point where it have conducted 9/11. It was in response to this argument that trump was making that somehow President Bush was responsible for 9/11. And my argument was, no, the responsibility of 9/11 falls on the fact that Al Qaeda was allowed to grow and prosper and the decision was not made to take out their leader when the chance existed to do so. Not once but four times according to the 9/11 report. President Clinton has acknowledged that has as a regret. So the bottom line is that Al Qaeda was able to carry out 9/11 because as an organization they grew and prospered in capability led by Osama bin Laden. Had bin Laden been taken out, it is doubtful that 9/11 would have happened. At least on September 11 of 2001 because Al Qaeda would not have been in a position to be able to carry something like that out."
TODD: "So you’re not blaming 9/11 on Bill Clinton?"
RUBIO: "No, he made a decision not to take out its leader which I think ended up being there, the situation that happened with 9/11. And as a response to an attack that the reason why 9/11 happened was because of George W. Bush. My argument is if you’re going to ascribe blame, don’t blame George W. Bush, blame a decision that was made earlier not to take out bin Laden when the opportunity presented itself."
TODD: "So I’m actually still not quite clear. Are you putting this on — are you putting 9/11 on bill Clinton?"
RUBIO: "No, I’m putting it on his decision not to take out bin Laden, absolutely. This is what happens when you have a chance to take out the leader of a terrorist organization and you fail to do so and the results are something like 9/11."