Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., wants President Trump’s pick for NATO ambassador confirmed “as quickly as possible,” he said while praising the prospective diplomat.
“I’m very, very happy to see you before this committee and I’m very anxious to get you confirmed as quickly as we can because I think this is incredibly important,” Kaine told former Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison during her Senate Foreign Relations Committee confirmation hearing Thursday.
Kaine, who ran for vice president alongside Hillary Clinton in 2016, touted the Hutchison’s nomination as a convincing repudiation of Trump’s most controversial comments about NATO and Russia. That includes the president’s aversion to blaming Russia for the 2016 cyberattacks against the Democratic party and Clinton’s campaign.
“I was very, very worried in the early days of this administration to hear the president basically suggest that Russia wasn’t doing wrong, but also to say that NATO was obsolete,” Kaine told Hutchison. “Your nomination sends a signal that the NATO relationship is an important one. I don’t think the administration would have asked somebody of your qualification if they didn’t mean to send a signal that whatever the earlier statements or thoughts about NATO, there is now a commitment.”
Hutchison used her opening statement to amplify that signal and echo Trump’s call for increased defense spending by allies. She also maintained that NATO has “evolved” and remains a bulwark against “Russian aggression,” including in cyberspace.
“Russian disinformation campaigns and malign influence activities targeting NATO Allies and Partners seek to undermine Western democratic institutions and principles, and sow disunity in longstanding transatlantic bonds,” Hutchison, a Texas Republican, told the committee. “I hope to represent the integrity of American commitments. To be a formidable enemy, we must be a reliable Ally. I want America to be both.”
