Pompeo's deputy expected as next Russia ambassador
Trump to replace Jon Huntsman with John Sullivan.
President WASHINGTON — Donald Trump is expected to name John Sullivan, the deputy secretary of state, to be the next ambassador to Russia, replacing Jon Huntsman Jr. as his liaison to Moscow, a senior administration official said.
The post of ambassador to Moscow is a prestigious diplomatic position that is always challenging, but even more so after a two-year federal investigation into the Trump campaign’s possible ties to the Kremlin.
Sullivan has been confirmed once by the Senate. Should Trump move ahead with his appointment, he will face a new hearing.
Officials at the White House and State Department declined to comment.
The role is particularly sensitive given the frenzy over questions about Trump’s ties with Russia, dating to the 2016 campaign and his years as a businessman, and the president’s continued efforts to build a working relationship with President Vladi- mir Putin despite Russia’s aggressive actions around the world, including attempts to interfere with elections in the United States.
Sullivan, who has served as a senior lawyer in other government departments, would come to the post with limited diplomatic experience dealing with Moscow, which practices a notoriously canny brand of diplomacy.
Former government officials who have worked closely with the Russians saw Sullivan as an unlikely, if uncontroversial, choice for the post, likely to exert limited influence over rela- tions with Russia.
“The challenge for any political-appointee ambassador in Moscow is to be taken seriously by the Russians,” said Stephen Sestanovich, who served as the State Department’s ambassador at large to the former Soviet Union during the Clin- ton administration. Sullivan is “not known as a big player in the Washington policy process,” he said, nor is he widely known for his Russia expertise.
A genial and generally wellliked figure at Foggy Bottom, Sullivan boasts a conventional resume for an establishment Republican. A prac- ticing lawyer before he joined the Trump administration in early 2017, he served in the George H.W. Bush administration as a Justice Department official and under Pres- ident George W. Bush as a Defense Department counsel and the No. 2 official in the Commerce Department.
He joined the State Depart- ment when it was led by Secretary Rex Tillerson, whom Trump fired in March of last year. His departure for Russia would allow Pompeo to install an ally of his choosing.
At his 2017 Senate confirmation hearing, Sullivan took a tough line toward Russia’s 2016 election interference and aggression toward its neighbors, such as its annexation of the Crimean penin- sula of Ukraine in 2014.
“I believe we have to be robust in our response to this intrusion into our democ- racy,” he said. “Interference with our political processes is simply unacceptable. It’s a profound threat to our way of life, and we have to respond as robustly as possible with all the means we have at our disposal.”
Russia has not been a cen- tral part of Sullivan’s portfolio, but last month he led a delegation of Trump administration officials who met with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Ryabkov, in Geneva to discuss arms control and other security issues.
In December, he toured central and Eastern Europe where he pressed officials on Russia’s “destabilizing” and “malign activities,” according to a State Department news release about the trip.
As ambassador since October 2017, Huntsman maintained a low profile in Moscow. But he made quiet, if largely futile, efforts to thaw relations between Washing- ton and Moscow before submitting his resignation earlier this month. It is effec- tive on Oct. 3.
During a June 28 meeting with Putin at the Group of 20 summit in Osaka, Japan, Trump spoke in warm terms about the Russian leader.
“We have had a very, very good relationship,” he said. “A lot of very positive things going to come out of the rela- tionship.”
Although the report by Robert Mueller, the special counsel, did not find that Trump’s 2016 campaign had conspired with the Kremlin, members of both parties in Congress are determined to maintain stiff sanctions on Moscow over its election interference detailed by Mueller, and for Russia’s annexation of Crimea.
Sestanovich s aid t hat Putin’s government is frus- trated by the continued hostility it faces in Washington, as well as mixed signals from Trump’s own administra- tion, where Russia hawks have resisted the president’s efforts to improve relations.
He said the Kremlin is likely resigned to regrouping after the 2020 presiden- tial election and waiting out the remainder of Trump’s administration if needed.
“A lot of Russians will tell you they’ve written this administration off,” he said. “They don’t understand how to deal with it, they don’t know what the president means when he speaks. So why bother?”