Tillerson appears set to win confirmation
State post likely for Texan despite panel’s misgivings
WASHINGTON — The Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on a party-line vote Monday, recommended that Rex Tillerson be confirmed as secretary of state, clearing the way for the former Exxon Mobil CEO to make an unprecedented leap from the corporate world to the nation’s highest diplomatic post.
The 11-10 vote came after the last of the Republican opposition to Tillerson melted away, making it all but certain the Texan will be confirmed by the full Senate, where the GOP holds 52 of the 100 seats. A Senate vote is expected next week.
On Monday, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, said he would vote for Tillerson, following two other GOP critics, Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and John McCain of Arizona, who disclosed Sunday that they would support Tillerson. However, they contin-
ued to express misgivings about Tillerson’s past business dealings with Russian President Vladimir Putin and his refusal to publicly chastise Putin and other leaders accused of human rights abuses.
“I remain concerned that in the years to come, our country will not give the defense of democracy and human rights the priority they deserve,” Rubio wrote in a Facebook post. “Given the uncertainty that exists both at home and abroad about the direction of our foreign policy, it would be against our national interests to have this confirmation unnecessarily delayed or embroiled in controversy.”
Tillerson appears set to become secretary of state at a time of increasing anxiety about America’s place in the world following the election of President Donald Trump, who campaigned on a more isolationist, protectionist foreign policy. He would take over the State Department with no government experience — something many scholars believe has never been tried in American history.
Joe Barnes, a fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute, said the closest in experience to Tillerson is former Secretary of State George Shultz, who was serving in upper management of an engineering firm when selected by former President Ronald Reagan. Shultz had served as Labor secretary and Treasury secretary under former President Richard Nixon.
“He’s not a foreign policy wonk,” Barnes said. “He is an unusual, but not necessarily bad choice for secretary of state. As far as I can tell, they’ve all had some sort foreign policy or government experience, in some shape or form.”
But at Exxon Mobil, Tillerson, 64, ran a company often likened to a country in terms of the size and scope of its global oil and gas business. That business experience found a receptive ear with Trump, who promised a U.S. foreign policy tougher on trade deals and “based on American interests.”
From Russian cyberattacks to economic competition with China to strained relations with Mexico, Tillerson will have a full docket when he takes office. How will he handle it?
In his confirmation hearing, he was vague on specifics. But in an exchange with Rubio over human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia, he offered a view of the world that was more pragmatic than ideological.
“There seems to be some misunderstanding that somehow I see the world through a different lens. And I do not,” he told Rubio. “I share all of the same values that you share and want the same things for people the world over in terms of freedoms. But I’m also clear-eyed and realistic about dealing in cultures. These are centuries-long cultures.”
Such language is in line with American foreign policy going back decades, experts say, a wish to spread democracy and cull human right abuses while understanding that compromise with autocratic regimes is often necessary. In an interview this month, John Hamre, president of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank for which Tillerson is a board member, said the Exxon Mobil CEO’s negotiating energy development deals in Russia and Yemen had prepared him for the role.
“He falls squarely in the classic American realpolitik model of foreign policy,” Hamre said. “What are our interests and what are the interests of the other guy?”
Tillerson struggled to convince those wary of his political naiveté at a hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee this month, as senators from both parties grilled him over his lack of government experience. Tillerson’s clear-headed, engineer’s language — as opposed to the polished tone of the politician — also rattled some lawmakers.
As the Foreign Relations Committee prepared to vote Monday evening, some Democratic senators said they found Tillerson’s response to questions about human rights abuses lacking in passion.
When asked about global crises, such as the brutal civil war in Syria, Tillerson answered he would need access to classified documents before being able to answer.
“You need to have a view that when you’re going to be secretary of state, the world is going to be looking to you on these issues,” said Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., the ranking Democrat on the committee.
Every Democrat refused to support Tillerson, though the vote became a formality after Rubio gave the Trump administration all the committee votes it needed.