Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., said President Trump’s “castration” of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is pushing the United States into a corner from which it will be forced to decide whether to engage in war or allow a nuclear North Korea and possibly Iran with the capability of threatening the U.S.
“You cannot publicly castrate your own secretary of state without giving yourself that binary choice,” Corker, the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, told the Washington Post in a story published Friday.
Trump has been accused of undercutting Tillerson in a tweet earlier this month that said Tillerson should not continue negotiating with North Korea because it was “wasting his time” after Tillerson revealed the State Department has direct communication lines with Pyongyang.
Corker asserted that Tillerson has played an important role in addressing North Korea by developing diplomacy with China and thus Trump’s negative comments about Tillerson’s work deters the Chinese from cooperating with the U.S. to put more pressure on North Korea.
“When you jack the legs out from under your chief diplomat, you cause all that to fall apart,” Corker told the Washington Post. “Us working with [Beijing] effectively is the key to not getting to a binary choice. When you publicly castrate your secretary of state, you take that off the table.”
After the report from NBC News last week about tensions between Tillerson and Trump, the president called it a “totally phony story” and Tillerson publicly affirmed his support of Trump.
Corker and Trump also clashed this week after the Republican senator told the New York Times in a recent interview he has “concerns” about the president and that “we could be heading towards World War III.”
“He concerns me,” Corker told the New York Times. “He would have to concern anyone who cares about our nation.”
Corker will not be seeking re-election in the 2018 election.
