Sen. Rand Paul urged President Trump on Monday to choose a new chief of staff who agrees with Trump on foreign policy, instead of someone who will actively work against him.
“He needs someone in that position who actually agrees with his instincts,” Paul, R-Ky., said on Fox News Monday.
“One of the president’s strongest instincts that he’s had for a long time is that the Iraq war and regime change in the Middle East is a mistake,” Paul said. “He’s also said that we’re spending so much money around the world that other countries need to take more care of themselves.”
“He’s said that we’ve been in Afghanistan a long time and we really need to decide, do we still have a military mission there?” he added.
“These are the president’s instincts that I very strongly support,” Paul said. “He needs to find somebody to be chief of staff that’s not trying to get in the way of his instincts, not trying to stymie his policy.”
Paul spoke just a day after it became clear that Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff, Nick Ayers, would decline an offer to replace outgoing chief of staff John Kelly. That surprise news had some guessing that Trump would need to start his search from scratch, although the president tweeted Sunday he would make his choice “soon.”
