https://news.vice.com/story/senators-are-eager-to-grill-trumps-likely-secretary-of-state-over-his-friendship-with-putin
“Friend of Vladimir”
Trump's leading candidate for secretary of state has some senators
worried
Senators are eager to grill Trump’s likely secretary of state over
his friendship with Putin
By Olivia Becker on Dec 12, 2016
Rex Tillerson, the apparent front-runner to become President-elect
Donald Trump’s secretary of state, can expect a very tough job interview.
Tillerson, the chief executive of Exxon Mobil, is one of the few
Americans who can call Russian President Vladimir Putin a personal friend.
Tillerson has represented Exxon’s interests in Russia since the 1990s and has
spent years lobbying the U.S. government to ease sanctions against the country-
Although Trump’s transition team said they won’t formally announce
their pick until later this week, Tillerson met with the president-elect for
more than two hours on Saturday and is said to be “in a different league” from
the other people being considered for the job, the New York Times reported.
But Tillerson’s close ties to Russia are making some prominent
Republican hawks nervous. “It’s a matter of concern to me that he has such a
close personal relationship with Vladimir Putin,” Sen. John McCain said on CBS’
“Face the Nation” on Sunday. “That would color his approach to Vladimir Putin
and the Russian threat.” In 2013, Putin personally awarded Tillerson the Order
of Friendship, one of Russia’s highest honors given to foreign civilians.
Sen. Marco Rubio also slammed Tillerson in a semi-veiled tweet
Sunday. “Being a ‘friend of Vladimir’ is not an attribute I am hoping for from
a Secretary of State,” the Republican said.
Rubio is a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which
has to vote on Tillerson before the entire Senate confirms him. Republicans
currently hold 52 seats in the chamber, and if Democrats unify against him,
Tillerson will need all but two of them to vote for him with Vice
President-elect Pence breaking the tie.
Tillerson isn’t the only one of Trump’s expected State Department
picks who will face a difficult Senate confirmation process. Republican Sen.
Rand Paul, also a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, said he would
block the nomination of former ambassador John Bolton to the No. 2 position in
the State Department.
“John Bolton doesn’t get it. He still believes in regime change.
He’s still a big cheerleader for the Iraq War,” Paul said Sunday during an
appearance on ABC’s “This Week.” “John Bolton is so far out of it and has such
a naive understanding of the world.”
On Tillerson, however, the libertarian senator said he’d “reserve
judgment.”
Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham also expressed discomfort with
Tillerson and his connections to Russia. “I don’t know the man much at all, but
let’s put it this way: If you received an award from the Kremlin, [an] Order of
Friendship, then we’re gonna have some talkin’,” Graham told the Washington
Post. “We’ll have some questions. I don’t want to pre-judge the guy, but that’s
a bit unnerving.”
Democrats are also uneasy about Tillerson filling the job of top
diplomat. Senator Ben Cardin, the ranking Democrat on the Foreign Relations
Committee, said on CNN Sunday he was “concerned about his [Tillerson’s]
relationship with Russia. We want to make sure that the secretary of state is a
person who represents America.”
Trump cited Tillerson’s close relationship with Putin and Russia as
an asset, not a concern, for the job. During an interview with “Fox News
Sunday,” the president-elect called Tillerson a “world-class player” who does
“massive deals in Russia.”
But Tillerson could be helped by a numbers game. Democrats will
have to pick their battles when it comes to fighting Trump’s appointments, and
they’ve already expressed their distaste with his choice for attorney general,
Health and Human Services, Environmental Protection Agency, and Treasury
secretary. Indeed, no Republican lawmaker has said outright they would oppose
Tillerson. Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the Foreign Relations
Committee, tweeted that he is a “very impressive individual.”
The biggest deal Tillerson signed with Russia, which took place in
2011, allowed Exxon and Russia’s state-run oil company, Rosneft, to jointly
drill for oil in Russian-controlled areas of the Arctic, the Black Sea, and
Siberia. Tillerson received the Order of Friendship shortly thereafter.
Follow Olivia Becker on Twitter: @OliviaLbecker
