The Washington Post reports that last week, President-elect Donald Trump was agonizing over his shortlist of candidates for secretary of state—which included Mitt Romney, Bob Corker, Rudy Giuliani, and David Petraeus. Trump was reportedly unsatisfied with his choices when a new name, that of ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, came across his desk.
The Post has the details:
Then, by happenstance, Trump welcomed into his office a man who has served presidents of both parties, Robert M. Gates. Trump asked his guest, a former CIA director and former defense secretary, what he thought of the four candidates. After Gates ran through his thoughts, it seemed that Trump was “looking for a way out,” a person familiar with the session said. Trump asked whether there was someone else to consider. “I recommend Rex,” Gates told Trump, referring to Rex Tillerson, the chief executive of ExxonMobil. Gates said in an interview that he had not gone to the meeting intending to recommend Tillerson, and he did not recommend anyone else. Separately, on the previous day, former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice had proposed Tillerson to Vice President-elect Mike Pence. Rice and Gates, who run a consulting firm that counts ExxonMobil as a client, had jointly concluded that Tillerson might give Trump a fresh alternative.
Read the whole account of how Trump made his decision to nominate Tillerson here.
