WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said Friday he was "disappointed" after K.T. McFarland — picked by him as his nominee to be the US ambassador to Singapore — asked to withdraw her stalled nomination, according to a statement released by the Office of the Press Secretary.
McFarland was on Trump’s presidential transition team and later appointed as the deputy national security adviser under Michael Flynn.
While Trump, as per the statement, acknowledged that the official "served my Administration with distinction", he chose to put the onus on "some Democrats [who] chose to play politics rather than move forward with a qualified nominee for a critically important post".
"I wish K.T. the best as she uses her considerable wisdom and skill as a commentator to explain to the American people how to make American foreign policy great again," the statement added.
Trump had nominated McFarland last May to be the US envoy to Singapore, but when the US Senate did not act on the nomination by the end of 2017, the White House resubmitted her nomination in early January.
McFarland’s nomination became stalled due to concerns about her testimony to Congress over communications with Russia, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said in December.
“I am asking that you withdraw my nomination to be the US Ambassador to Singapore,” McFarland said in a letter sent to the president, a copy of which was seen by Reuters. “I have come to this decision reluctantly, because I believe in your mission.”
McFarland said in the letter that she believed Trump had “laid the foundations for a new foreign policy that puts America’s interests ahead of, but not at the expense of, our obligations to others.”
“Know that I have no intention of withdrawing from the national debate and I want to help you in whatever way I can,” she said.
McFarland — a former Fox News national security analyst — had said in a written response to a question from a Senate Foreign Relations Committee member that she was “not aware” of communications between Flynn and Sergei Kislyakwhen the latter was the ambassador to Russia.
The New York Times reported it had obtained an email McFarland sent on December 29, 2016— the day former President Barack Obama’s administration authorized new sanctions against Russia — saying Flynn would talk to Kislyak that evening.
Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) about his contacts with Russia and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors delving into the actions of Trump’s inner circle before he took office.