Senate foreign relations committee looks short of the votes for Pompeo, who was chosen by Trump to replace Rex Tillerson

Donald Trump’s nomination of Mike Pompeo for secretary of state encountered significant headwinds on Wednesday, as the Senate foreign relations committee looked short of the votes to deliver him a positive recommendation.

A majority of Democrats on the Senate panel announced their opposition to Pompeo, who has served as Trump’s CIA director and was chosen by the president last month to replace Rex Tillerson at the helm of the state department. Concerns over Pompeo’s nomination were amplified among some Democrats after it was revealed late on Tuesday that he secretly met with the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, in Pyongyang earlier this month.

“He just left North Korea,” Trump said on Wednesday. “Had a great meeting with Kim Jong-un and got along with him really well, really great, and he’s that kind of a guy.”

He added: “I think Mike Pompeo is extraordinary. He was number one at West Point. He was top at Harvard. He’s a great gentleman ... I think Mike Pompeo will go down as one of the great secretaries of state.”

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Senator Bob Menendez, the ranking Democrat on the committee, criticized the CIA director for failing to disclose the North Korea meeting even as they discussed the topic privately.

“I don’t expect diplomacy to be negotiated out in the open, but I do expect for someone who is the nominee to be secretary of state, when he speaks with committee leadership and is asked specific questions about North Korea, to share some insights about such a visit,” Menendez said on Wednesday.

The uncertainty over Pompeo’s fate with the committee could force Republicans to take the unusual step of sending his nomination to the Senate floor without a favorable recommendation.

But on Wednesday afternoon, senior figures attempted to come to his aid. The White House counselor Kellyanne Conway and Senator Tom Cotton, a Republican from Arkansas, said there is “no reason” Pompeo should not receive the same bipartisan vote he earned during his confirmation as director of the CIA.

During a White House briefing with reporters, Conway and Cotton said they were confident Pompeo will be confirmed by the full Senate, regardless of what happens during the committee hearing.

Pompeo’s trip to North Korea is the “best evidence imaginable that he’s committed to diplomacy”, Cotton said on the call, and that should assuage Democrats’ concern that he is too “bellicose” to be secretary of state.

Cotton said: “It would send a very bad sign and would set back the preparation and perhaps the results of that summit for the Senate Democrats to oppose as a block Mike Pompeo.”

Earlier, Senator Rand Paul, a libertarian Republican on the committee, joined Democrats in opposing Pompeo’s nomination, citing the CIA director’s support for the Iraq war and torture techniques. Pompeo can afford to lose only one vote on the Senate committee.

Without Paul’s support, he would require at least one Democrat on the panel to cross the aisle in his favor. All but one of the committee’s Democrats, Senator Chris Coons of Delaware, have said they will vote against him. Senator Jeff Flake, a Republican on the committee, is also undecided.



“I will say this about Rand Paul, he’s never let me down,” said Trump. “Rand Paul is a very special guy as far as I’m concerned; he’s never let me down and I don’t think he’ll let us down again... So I have a lot of confidence in Rand but I also have a great deal of confidence in Mike Pompeo.”

In addition to Pompeo’s past defense of so-called “enhanced interrogation methods”, Democrats also took issue with his controversial statements on Islam and homosexuality. Senator Tim Kaine, a Democrat on the foreign relations panel who supported Pompeo’s nomination for CIA director, denounced Pompeo’s “anti-diplomacy disposition”.

Other Democrats echoed the notion that Pompeo would prioritize military solutions over diplomatic negotiations.

“This weekend’s illegal and counterproductive strikes against the Syrian government underscore the urgent need for a secretary of state who will stand up for the constitution and articulate to the president the danger of American military hubris,” Chris Murphy, a senator from Connecticut, said in a declaring his opposition to Pompeo.

Pompeo faced tough questions during his confirmation hearing before the Senate foreign relations committee last week. But Democrats, in particular, were left dissatisfied with his answers. Pompeo notably declined to say he would resign if the president fired special counsel Robert Mueller, who is overseeing the federal investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and potential collusion between the Trump campaign and Moscow.

Republicans have indicated that they would move ahead with a confirmation vote regardless of the outcome. But even then, Republicans only hold a two-vote advantage over Democrats in the full Senate.

Additional reporting by Julian Borger and David Smith