President Donald Trump appointed Jon Huntsman Jr. to serve as ambassador to Russia, and he was confirmed in September of last year. | AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin, pool Politics Jon Huntsman Jr. reveals he has stage 1 cancer

U.S. Ambassador to Russia Jon Huntsman Jr. said he has cancer in an interview with The Deseret News published Thursday.

Huntsman told the Salt Lake City newspaper that he had stage 1 cancer during an interview in September. Huntsman said that he would get treatment and that "we’ll be fine.” Still, he said, "It kind of puts things in perspective."


President Donald Trump appointed Huntsman to serve as ambassador to Russia, and he was confirmed in September of last year. Following the publication of an anonymous op-ed in The New York Times detailing a resistance within the Trump administration, speculation began circling that Huntsman penned the op-ed. Huntsman has denied writing it.

Huntsman told The Deseret News that he was sensitive to his diagnosis being publicized, concerned with how the Russians would use the information. He said his doctors caught the cancer early and that he was optimistic.