Former Fox News anchor Nauert ends bid to be next US ambassador to UN
Former Fox News anchor and State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Saturday that she has withdrawn from consideration to be the next US ambassador to the United Nations.
Nauert was named by President Donald Trump to replace Nikki Haley who resigned at the end of last year, but her nomination was never officially submitted to the Senate for confirmation.
"I am grateful to President Trump and Secretary Pompeo for the trust they placed in me for considering me for the position of US Ambassador to the United Nations. However, the past two months have been grueling for my family and therefore it is in the best interest of my family that I withdraw my name from consideration."
The State Department said Trump would soon make an announcement about a new nominee.
The abrupt statement, issued in the evening of a holiday weekend, came after weeks of often mocking criticism of the nomination of Nauert, who had no foreign policy experience until two years ago when she was named State Department spokeswoman.
Opponents questioned whether Nauert, despite her poise at the podium, had the gravitas and skill to go head-to-head on complex international issues with seasoned diplomats from adversaries such as Russia.
President Donald Trump, an avid viewer of conservative-leaning Fox News where Nauert was once an anchor on morning show "Fox and Friends," told reporters in December that he wanted her to be UN ambassador.
Her nomination, however, was never formally submitted to the Senate and she has vanished for over two months as she prepared for a confirmation hearing -- and, eventually, the top diplomatic job.
With Trump's Republican Party in control of the Senate, her nomination had not seemed to be in serious risk, barring any disclosure that had not been made public.
The UN post has been vacant since the start of the year after Nikki Haley, a former governor seen as a rising star in Republican politics, decided to leave after two years in the position.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo praised Nauert in a statement, saying that he had "great respect" for her "personal" decision to withdraw.
From Fox anchor to UN envoy, a meteoric rise
Less than two years ago, Heather Nauert was working as an anchor on Donald Trump's favorite news show, "Fox & Friends."
After Trump was inaugurated as president in January 2017, Nauert became -- with no experience in government, foreign policy or politics -- the spokeswoman at the State Department.
When Trump fired media-shy Texas oilman Rex Tillerson as his secretary of state in March via tweet -- their relationship by then bordered on poisonous -- Nauert saw her influence grow under successor Mike Pompeo, whose combative style is more in tune with the president.
She also got a major promotion, becoming the acting under-secretary for public diplomacy and public affairs, the fourth highest official at the State Department.
Overnight she took charge of overseeing communication from US diplomatic missions around the world as well as countering propaganda from the Islamic State movement and other foreign adversaries.