Policy should be 'adaptable' while values remain uncompromised, Tillerson says

Rex Tillerson on Meet the Press

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in an interview with NBC's Chuck Todd on Sunday pushed back against criticism Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) lobbed at his approach to foreign policy in a recent New York Times op-ed.

McCain originally went after Tillerson for the secretary of state's assertion that "in some circumstances, if you condition our national security efforts on someone adopting our values, we probably can't achieve our national security goals." "With those words, Secretary Tillerson sent a message to oppressed people everywhere," McCain argued: "'Don't look to the United States for hope.'"

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Bonnie Kristian

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.