- Rex Tillerson, the former Exxon Mobil oil company president and chief executive that Trump appointed as the Secretary of State, was even given the highest award that the Russians give to foreign people by Putin himself. Trump and Tillerson are gutting the State Department; employees that have worked there for decades have been fired.
June 29th 2017 Max Bergmann of Politico wrote: I heard that the State Department was in “chaos,” “a disaster,” “terrible,” the leadership “totally incompetent.” This reflected what I had been hearing the past few months from friends still inside the department, but hearing it in rapid fire made my stomach churn. As I walked through the halls once stalked by diplomatic giants like Dean Acheson and James Baker, the deconstruction was literally visible. Furniture from now-closed offices crowded the hallways. Dropping in on one of my old offices, I expected to see a former colleague—a career senior foreign service officer—but was stunned to find out she had been abruptly forced into retirement and had departed the previous week. This office, once bustling, had just one person present, keeping on the lights. This is how diplomacy dies. Not with a bang, but with a whimper. With empty offices on a midweek afternoon.
When Rex Tillerson was announced as secretary of state, there was a general feeling of excitement and relief in the department. After eight years of high-profile, jet-setting secretaries, the building was genuinely looking forward to having someone experienced in corporate management. Like all large, sprawling organizations, the State Department’s structure is in perpetual need of an organizational rethink. That was what was hoped for, but that is not what is happening. Tillerson is not reorganizing, he’s downsizing. While the lack of senior political appointees has gotten a lot of attention, less attention has been paid to the hollowing out of the career workforce, who actually run the department day to day. Tillerson has canceled the incoming class of foreign service officers. This as if the Navy told all of its incoming Naval Academy officers they weren’t needed. Senior officers have been unceremoniously pushed out. Many saw the writing on the wall and just retired, and many others are now awaiting buyout offers. He has dismissed State’s equivalent of an officer reserve—retired FSOs, who are often called upon to fill State’s many short-term staffing gaps, have been sent home despite no one to replace them. Office managers are now told three people must depart before they can make one hire.
On All In with Chris Hayes Sebastian Gorka insists he wasn’t trying to bash the Secretary of State. We check the tape.
On The 11th Hour with Brian Williams Richard Painter, a former ethics attorney for President George W. Bush reacts to comments made by Trump aide Sebastian Gorka at Secretary of State Rex Tillerson saying he should be ‘fire on the spot.’
- August 25th 2017 as reported in The New York Times: Sebastian Gorka, an outspoken adviser to Trump and lightning rod for controversy, has been forced out of his position at the White House, two administration officials said on Friday (August 25th 2017).
One of the officials said that the president’s chief of staff, John F. Kelly, had telegraphed his lack of interest in keeping Mr. Gorka during internal discussions over the last week.
Mr. Gorka, a deputy assistant to the president, had been on vacation for at least the last two weeks, that official said. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about personnel issues.
The Federalist, a conservative website, published portions of what it called a resignation letter written by Mr. Gorka. It quoted him as saying that given which “forces” were on the rise in the White House, the best way for him to support the president was from outside it.
The White House, seeking to blunt Mr. Gorka’s claim that he had resigned, put out an unattributed statement saying that he no longer works in the administration, but that he did not resign.
His departure is the latest in a string of them since Mr. Kelly, a retired Marine general, took over as the White House chief of staff last month. Mr. Gorka criticized Rex W. Tillerson, the secretary of state, in a public show of disrespect that chafed Mr. Kelly’s sense of order, according to one senior administration official.
Mr. Gorka also said that in fighting terrorism, white supremacists should not be a concern. He made the remarks shortly before the racially charged violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, in which a man who was said to admire Adolf Hitler rammed his car into counterprotesters and left a woman dead.
Efforts to reach Mr. Gorka on Friday night were not immediately successful.
Mr. Gorka, who described himself as a national security adviser to the president but who existed outside the National Security Council and had no clear duties, was a divisive figure while in the White House. He memorably declared that “the alpha males are back” as an assertion of the distance between the Obama administration and the current one.
He has also been a vocal defender of the Trump administration’s efforts to temporarily ban travel from some predominantly Muslim countries; he has said violence is a fundamental part of Islam and emanates from the language of the Quran. His hard-line views on Islam have prompted his critics to accuse him of Islamophobia.
Mr. Gorka, 46, has also been accused of having links to far-right groups in Europe. He is a former editor at Breitbart News, a right-wing website, and a friend of Stephen K. Bannon. Mr. Bannon, who was until last week Mr. Trump’s chief strategist, has since returned to Breitbart News as executive chairman.
