(Bloomberg) — President Donald Trump said Wednesday he’ll appoint Robert O’Brien as his White House national security advisor, elevating the State Department’s top hostage envoy from relative obscurity to one of the most important jobs in U.S. government.
O’Brien had the backing of Secretary of State Michael Pompeo, whose central role shaping the administration’s foreign policy will be solidified by the appointment.
Trump fired the former national security advisor, John Bolton, last week after disputes over the administration’s foreign policy and Afghanistan, Iran and elsewhere. Trump said Tuesday he was considering a list of five finalists for the job, including O’Brien.
O’Brien has no known experience managing an organization the size of the National Security Council, which grew to about 400 employees under President Barack Obama but has been pared down under Trump.
Before being named hostage envoy, O’Brien had been a partner at a California law firm and advised the 2016 presidential campaigns of Texas Senator Ted Cruz and former Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker. He was now-Senator Mitt Romney’s senior foreign policy adviser when the Utah Republican ran for president in 2012.
O’Brien leads the State Department’s efforts to secure the release of U.S. hostages held by foreign governments, including North Korea and Iran. Previously, he worked for Bolton when he was United Nations ambassador in the George W. Bush administration. He was a State Department official under former Secretary Hillary Clinton.
But his foreign policy views largely align with Trump’s. In his book “While America Slept,” which was published shortly before the 2016 election and highlights his own foreign experience, O’Brien railed against what he called Obama’s “lead from behind” approach and accused the former president of emboldening “autocrats, tyrants and terrorists.”
It’s unclear what Trump meant when he said he’s worked “long and hard” with O’Brien. His most prominent role in the administration thus far engendered widespread derision: the president’s decision to dispatch him to Sweden to monitor legal proceedings involving A$AP Rocky, an American rapper who was arrested after a Stockholm street fight.
The rapper, whose real name is Rakim Mayers, was convicted and given a conditional jail sentence, but the Swedes released him after Trump took up his cause on Twitter.
O’Brien didn’t answer a phone call on Wednesday or respond to an email seeking comment.
Trump gave Pompeo a significant say in choosing the next national security adviser, after the secretary of State repeatedly clashed with Bolton. Bolton’s departure left Pompeo unchallenged as Trump’s closest foreign policy adviser.
Pompeo had favored O’Brien and Ricky Waddell, a former national security official in the Trump administration.
(Updates with additional background on O’Brien beginning in fourth paragraph.)
–With assistance from Jordan Fabian.
To contact the reporter on this story: Nick Wadhams in Washington at [email protected]
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at [email protected], Justin Blum
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