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By APD Writer Lu Jiafei
As a sophisticated man at the helm of a government department with a nickname of “Fudge Factory”, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s replies to tough questions are usually tinged with diplomatic ambiguity.
That changed over the weekend when he was asked to say whether U.S. President Donald Trump speaks for U.S. values.
“The President speaks for himself,” said Tillerson flatly in an interview with Fox News host Chris Wallace.
U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
The jaw-dropping comment about the president by the country’s top diplomat was an exceptional but not isolated case as the fallout from Trump’s equivocal response to a deadly conflict at a white supremacist march in Virginia and his equally controversial move to pardon former Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio continue to drive a wedge between him and top officials within the government.
Tillerson’s remark was a response to Wallace’s questions about a UN panel’s criticism of Trump, in which the UN denounced “the failure at the highest political level of the United States of America to unequivocally reject and condemn” racist violence.
Since the deadly clash between neo-Nazi groups, racist skinhead groups, regional Ku Klux Klan groups and counter protesters in Charlottesville, Va., Trump seesawed in his response to the racial violence, alternating between blaming “both sides” and “many sides” and singling out white supremacists for the violence.
Trump’s equivocal statements stood in stark contrast to those of some top officials in the country, and on his interview on Sunday, Tillerson brushed away an opportunity apparently designed to clarify his stunning remark when Wallace asked him whether he was separating himself from Trump on the issue.
“I have spoken. I have made my own comments as to our values as well in a speech I gave to the State Department this past week,” Tillerson simply answered.
Tillerson was not the only highest-level official in the Trump administration to appear to distance themselves from Trump after the chaos in Charlottesville.
In a clip of video which surfaced online over the weekend, U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, a former U.S. Marine Corps general known for being disciplined and apolitical, urged U.S. troops stationed abroad in an informal speech to “hold the line,” and promised that “we’ll get the power of inspiration back.”
“Our country right now, it’s got problems we don’t have in the military … You just hold the line until our country gets back to understanding and respecting each other and showing it,” said Mattis.
It remains unclear whether Mattis was aware of his pep talk being recorded, but he apparently did not intend to keep secret his feeling towards the escalating division within the country, to which Trump has contributed more than his fair share.
As the country was still reeling from the racial violence in Charlottesville, Trump on Friday granted a presidential pardon to Arpaio, to many Americans a symbol of racism and bigotry.
At the age of 85, Arpaio was convicted in July of criminal contempt of court for ignoring a federal judge’s order to stop detaining people based solely on suspicion about their immigration status.
In his tenure as Arizona Sheriff from 1993 to 2016, Arpaio, a polarizing national figure in U.S. law enforcement and a darling of the far right, reportedly called his state’s jail a “concentration camp” and was known for his extreme stance on immigration policy.
The pardon soon drew criticism across the aisle, with some strongest rebukes coming from Trump’s own party.
According to a statement issued on Saturday, House Speaker Paul Ryan, third in line for the Presidency, “does not agree with this decision.”
“Law enforcement officials have a special responsibility to respect the rights of everyone in the United States. We should not allow anyone to believe that responsibility is diminished by this pardon,” said the statement.
Senator John McCain, the 2008 Republican presidential nominee, also ripped Trump for pardoning Arpaio, blasting him for undermining “his claim for the respect of rule of law.”
“Mr. Arpaio was found guilty of criminal contempt for continuing to illegally profile Latinos living in Arizona based on their perceived immigration status in violation of a judge’s orders.
The President has the authority to make this pardon, but doing so at this time undermines his claim for the respect of rule of law as Mr. Arpaio has shown no remorse for his actions,” said McCain in a statement.
With Trump continuously taking racially charged moves, those closely around him are not just feeling dismayed. They are drifting away from him.
Lu Jiafei, fellow of APD Institute. After spending one year in Palestine covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict between 2013 and 2014, Lu moved to Washington, D.C. and covered the 2016 U.S. presidential election till the very end of Donald Trump’s upset victory. He is a political contributor to APD.
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
