US President Donald Trump has nominated State Department spokeswoman and former Fox News anchor Heather Nauert to be the nation’s new ambassador to the UN.
If confirmed by the US Senate, Nauert will replace outgoing ambassador Nikki Haley, who announced her resignation from the position in October.
“In an administration rife with internal conflict and deeply distrustful of the UN”, Nauert’s appointment would “place a less senior person at the international agency” than former South Carolina governor Haley, says CNN.
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Haley repeatedly made headlines for her barbed attacks on other delegations at UN meetings.
Trump told reporters last month that Nauert was “under very serious consideration” to take over the role. “She’s excellent. She’s been with us a long time. She’s been a supporter for a long time,” said the president.
But not everyone is convinced. James Warren, executive editor of fact-checking website NewsGuard, has said that Trump’s “unconventional” pick is based on his “fascination with American cable news, and in particular with Fox Cable News Network”, Al Jazeera reports.
Who is she?
Nauert spent more than 20 years as a journalist, much of it as a Fox News correspondent and anchor at the helm of Fox and Friends, understood to be one of Trump’s favourite news programmes.
She did not have any political or policy-making experience until she was hired by Trump as a State Department spokesperson in April 2017, The Guardian reports. In June, she briefly went viral after citing D-Day as an example of US-German relations.
In addition to that role, Nauert was appointed acting undersecretary for public diplomacy and public affairs in March this year.
As Al Jazeera notes, the 48-year-old “will face a variety of challenges” if confirmed as UN ambassador, including “championing US efforts to contain Iran’s influence in the Middle East and ensuring the global body maintains tough sanctions on North Korea”.
Why is she being nominated?
According to The Guardian, the president has “reportedly sought out someone who will demonstrate loyalty” - a quality lacking in Haley, who publicly disagreed with Trump on a number of occasions during her time as ambassador.
By contrast, “Nauert has kept close ties to the West Wing and is seen by the president as more inclined to defend him on the job”, the newpaper adds.
However, both The New York Times and Al Jazeera suggest that Trump’s decision is based chiefly on Nauert’s appearances on Fox and Friends.
Al Jazeera says that it is “one of his favourite shows” and that Nauert’s association with it “surely had something to do with her selection”.
She is the latest in a series of former Fox News personalities to be recruited by Trump, along with national security adviser John Bolton, deputy White House chief of staff Bill Shine and strategic communications director Mercedes Schlapp.
And the reaction?
For the most part, the response to reports of Nauert’s nomination has been negative, with many critics angry that another crucial government position had been handed to a politically inexperienced Fox News alumna.
“Heather Nauert brings no experience, no understanding and, frankly, no interest in learning,” said Brian Dixon, senior vice president at Washington DC-based charity Population Connection Action Fund.
“Her main claim to this role is her willingness to defend the indefensible as a spokesperson. It’s hard to believe that this president could further diminish the view of the United States in the world, but this appointment is likely to do it,” Dixon added.
Striking a more ambivalent tone, Richard Gowan, a senior fellow at the Tokyo-based United Nations University, told CNN: “People don’t know very much about her. People are cautious.”
