As big cuts in foreign aid loom, State Department again endures resignations and turmoil

WASHINGTON - Saying he could no longer be "complicit" in the Trump administration, Chuck Park, an eight-year State Department veteran most recently posted to a U.S. consulate in Mexico, last week became the latest American diplomat to publicly and pointedly call it quits.

"Over three tours abroad, I worked to spread what I believed were American values: freedom, fairness and tolerance," Park wrote in an essay. "But more and more I found myself in a defensive stance, struggling to explain to foreign peoples the blatant contradictions at home."

The ranks of the United States' foreign policy establishment are being roiled once again by resignations, reports of partisan intimidation and looming massive cuts in foreign aid that critics in Congress and elsewhere contend weaken American diplomacy worldwide.

When Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo took over the State Department 16 months ago, there