Riyadh, Seoul … Wichita? Pompeo seeks refuge in home state
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s schedule usually reads like a list of foreign capitals. But America’s top diplomat has been finding ways to swing through his home state of Kansas this year, feeding speculation about a potential Senate run and offering a refuge from the storm surrounding him in Washington over impeachment.
On his fourth trip to Kansas this year, Pompeo was in Wichita Thursday for a visit that will get him local voter attention. He held a workforce development roundtable, a topic typically outside his foreign affairs portfolio, with Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter, adviser and sometime campaign surrogate. He conducted a handful of local interviews and posed for a photo op.
With his State Department at the center of an impeachment inquiry back in Washington, a reporter for The Wichita Eagle asked him a pointed question: “So, given everything that is going on in the world right now, you feel that this is the best use of your time as chief diplomat to be here?”
“Absolutely,” Pompeo shot back. “100%.”
The visit shows how Pompeo is trying to reconcile his conflicting ambitions in Washington and back home in Kansas. But as the impeachment inquiry intensifies, it’s growing increasingly clear that the scandal may bleed into Pompeo’s political future.
Republicans are eager to see Pompeo, a former congressman, seek the Kansas seat. The state is heavily Republican and has not elected a Democratic senator since 1932, but GOP leaders want to avoid the competitive election that would be likely should conservative lightning rod Kris Kobach win the Republican Party’s nomination.
“You betcha,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said when asked if he wanted Pompeo to run. He said he’s spoken to Pompeo about it “multiple times.”
Pompeo declared in July that a run was “off the table,” but many Republicans didn’t see that declaration as absolute and he’s remained coy about his plans since.
Kelly Arnold, a former Kansas GOP chairman, called Pompeo “the most popular Republican in the state” and said he continues to excite the party’s base.
“I love the fact that he’s in the position he’s at as secretary of state,” he said. “At the same time, I am selfish and would love to have him representing the state of Kansas, as well, as senator.”
A Senate run would be an abrupt shift for Pompeo, who is deeply enmeshed in an impeachment inquiry that revolves around the question of whether President Donald Trump improperly used American support for Ukraine as leverage against his 2020 rivals. Testimony to Congress so far has revealed that it was diplomats under Pompeo’s command who were involved in the effort and that he knew about it.
What Pompeo did about it is a mystery that he is coming under increasing pressure to clear up.