State Department reminds Sebastian Gorka: Rex Tillerson is ‘fourth in line to the presidency’
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s team on Thursday brushed back a White House aide who cast doubt on the validity of Tillerson’s statements about the likelihood of a conflict with North Korea.
“He’s a Cabinet secretary,” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said to reporters about Tillerson. “He’s fourth-in-line to the presidency. He carries a big stick.”
The comment arose from President Trump’s threat that North Korean belligerence would be met with “fire and fury,” which senior government officials then described in varying ways. After Tillerson urged Americans to “sleep well” in the belief that war is not imminent, White House adviser Sebastian Gorka suggested he had contradicted the president and spoken out-of-turn.
“You should listen to the president; the idea that Secretary Tillerson is going to discuss military matters is simply nonsensical,” Gorka told the BBC. “It is the job of [Defense Secretary Jim] Mattis, the secretary of defense, to talk about the military options, and he has done so unequivocally … Secretary Tillerson is the chief diplomat of the United States, and it is his portfolio to handle those issues.”
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Nauert noted that Tillerson and Mattis work closely on foreign policy. “As you know, the secretary, the president, Secretary Mattis along with the national security council [adviser] General McMaster — they meet frequently, they meet often to have national security issues,” she said.
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State Department reminds top Trump aide Gorka that Rex Tillerson is "fourth in line to the presidency" https://t.co/EvXLjDSqTM pic.twitter.com/vJBSmG2r2f
— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) August 10, 2017
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