Mike Pompeo’s Worldview? Do As Trump Does.
Even when they are thousands of miles apart, President Donald Trump and his secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, act in symbiosis.
As Trump speculated from Washington this week that “rogue killers” rather than Saudi leaders might have targeted the missing Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, Pompeo smiled with the crown prince in Riyadh and sidestepped mounting evidence that Khashoggi was murdered by the Saudi state, citing ongoing investigations. From the Oval Office and Brussels airport, each man emphasized how vital Saudi Arabia is to the U.S. economy and to American priorities like countering Iran and terrorist groups.
Pompeo’s management of the fallout from Khashoggi’s recent disappearance at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul has been morally fraught, on message even as the messages rapidly change, and laser-focused on American interests.
Through the crisis, Pompeo has delivered a master class in how
