Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call via Getty Images(WASHINGTON) — Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is defending the Trump administration’s foreign policy on Capitol Hill Wednesday, facing fierce questions from Republican and Democratic senators about North Korea, Russia, Iran, and more.
It’s Pompeo’s first time in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee after President Trump’s historic meetings with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and Russian leader Vladimir Putin – the outcomes of which are both now being called into question.
“You come before a group of senators today who are filled with serious doubts about this White House and its conduct of American foreign policy,” said the Republican chair of the committee, Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tennessee, adding, “We really need a clear understanding as to what is going on, what our president is agreeing to, and what our strategy is on a number of issues.”
Although he is from the same party as the president and secretary, Corker has often been critical of Trump, but he had some of his strongest words yet Wednesday.
“It’s the president’s actions that create tremendous distrust in our nation, among our allies. It’s palpable,” Corker told Pompeo, who shot back with his signature loyalty to the president.
“I disagree with most of what you said here. You somehow disconnect the administration’s activities from the president’s actions. They’re the one and the same,” Pompeo said, leading to a verbal tussle between the two.
It was a notable argument between the Trump administration’s top diplomat and the leading Republican senator on foreign policy. But a stone-faced Pompeo engaged in tense exchanges with Democrats too, starting with the committee’s ranking member, Sen. Bob Menendez, D-New Jersey, who pressed Pompeo on whether he knew what was discussed in Trump and Putin’s meeting.
“The predicate of your question implied some notion that there was something improper about having a one-on-one meeting. I completely disagree with the premise of your question,” Pompeo shot back, adding later that he had gotten a full readout from President Trump – and from Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
Pompeo wouldn’t specifically answer whether Trump and Putin discussed easing sanctions or whether Trump asked Putin to withdraw from Crimea or eastern Ukraine, repeatedly telling senators that “presidents are permitted to have conversations with their cabinet members that aren’t repeated in public.”
Amid questions about what was agreed to, Pompeo specifically pointed to coordination on counterterrorism and a possible business council as key outcomes from what he has described as “an incredibly important meeting.”
While senators from both parties criticized the administration for engaging with Putin despite his aggression in Europe and in cyberspace, Pompeo told the committee it was important to continue to keep channels open: “Now is the time for direct communication in our relationship in order to make clear to President Putin that there is the possibility, however remote it might be, to reverse the negative course of our relationship.”
Even as Trump has cast doubt on whether Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election, Pompeo said he made clear to Russian officials in Helsinki that there will be “severe consequences for interference in our democratic processes.”
“President Trump is well-aware of the challenges that Russia poses to the United States and our partners and allies. He has taken a staggering number of actions to protect our interests,” Pompeo added.
Shortly before the hearing started, Pompeo also issued a statement to say the U.S. still opposes Russia’s “attempted annexation” of Crimea, which violates “a bedrock international principle shared by democratic states – that no country can change the borders of another by force.”
Trump had previously left the door open to the U.S. recognizing Crimea as part of Russia, telling reporters, “We’re going to have to see.” National Security Adviser John Bolton fanned the flames, too, in an interview with CBS News, saying again, “We’ll see,” and adding, “The president makes the policy.”
Over six weeks since the Singapore summit, with few demonstrable signs of progress on North Korea’s denuclearization, Pompeo also faced questions about the administration’s diplomatic push with North Korea. Even though he confirmed that North Korea continues to produce fissile material that can create nuclear bombs, he said there had been progress towards denuclearization.
In particular, Pompeo welcomed new satellite images released Monday that showed North Korea taking steps to dismantle key facilities at a missile testing site, saying the U.S. was tracking the “disassembly” of the site and calling it “a good thing” and “steps forward.”
But he conceded, “There’s an awful long way to go… There remains a great deal of work to do. It will be highly contested – that is, the modalities, the means, the timing of this will be things that I’m confident we’ll be discussing for a period of time.”
Among those potential challenges, he refused to say whether the North Koreans are working on submarine-launched missiles or any other nuclear technology while in an open setting.
While the Trump administration tore up the “strategic patience” that was the Obama administration’s policy, Pompeo added that because of those timelines they “are engaged in patient diplomacy, but we will not let this drag out to no end.”
It’s unclear how long they are willing to give talks, but Pompeo said they are still aiming to achieve “complete denuclearization” before the end of Trump’s first term, if not sooner.
Pompeo visited Pyongyang less than a month after the summit, but he was denied the meeting with Kim that the White House said he would have, and the North Koreans bashed the U.S. for making “gangster-like” and “cancerous” demands in their two days of meetings.
Downplaying those tensions, Pompeo told senators the U.S. knows the “truth” of those meetings and talks continue.
This is an ongoing story. Please check back in for updates.
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