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Mike Pompeo
President Donald Trump has revoked government security protection for former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his top aide Brian Hook, who have faced threats from Iran ever since they took hardline stances on the Islamic Republic during Trump's first administration. A congressional staffer and a person familiar with the matter, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss personal security details, confirmed the change, but neither could offer an explanation. They said Pompeo and Hook were told of the loss of protection on Wednesday and that it took effect at 11 pm that night. It's another sign of steps Trump is taking just days into his return to the White House to target those he has perceived as adversaries. A day earlier, Trump revoked the security clearance and Secret Service protection from John Bolton, who was fired as Trump's national security adviser during his first term. He later wrote a book whose publication the White House unsuccessfully sought to block on grounds
President-elect Donald Trump ruled out two of his previous Cabinet members -- former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former envoy to the United Nations Nikki Haley to be part of his upcoming administration. Trump, 78, was elected as the 47th president of the United States. He defeated Vice President Kamala Harris, 60, in the elections held on November 5. In the first term, Trump served as the 45th president from January 20, 2017, to January 20, 2021. "I will not be inviting former Ambassador Nikki Haley, or former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, to join the Trump Administration, which is currently in formation, Trump said in a post on Truth Social. Pompeo served as the CIA Director and Secretary of State in his first term, while Haley served as his ambassador to the United Nations in the first two years of his presidency. Both his cabinet-ranking officials later entered the presidential race against him in the Republican primaries. While Pompeo dropped from the race early, Hale
The Biden administration has once again renewed taxpayer-funded protection for former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and one of his top aides, who have been the target of persistent threats from Iran. The State Department notified Congress late last month that the threats against Pompeo and Trump administration Iran envoy Brian Hook remain serious and credible and continue to warrant government-provided security details. The notifications are dated Dec. 19 but were not transmitted to Congress until December 22. They were obtained by The Associated Press on Wednesday. Tensions in the Middle East have soared since the outbreak of Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza and escalated further Wednesday after dozens of people were killed in blasts in Iran at a memorial service for Iran Revolutionary Guard commander Qassem Soleimani, who was assassinated in a US airstrike in Baghdad on January 3, 2020. Pompeo and Hook were the public faces of the US maximum pressure campaign against Iran afte
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeoasaid Friday he will not enter the race for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. The former secretary of state said on Fox News that he would not seek the GOP nomination in a contest that would have put the devoted ally and defender of Donald Trump into competition with his former commander in chief. Pompeo would have been the second former Trump Cabinet member to enter the race to challenge the former president for the 2024 GOP nomination, joining former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, who announced her campaign in February. Former Vice President Mike Pence is also considering entering the race and has stepped up his travel and activity in early-voting primary and caucus states.
Mike Pompeo has said that among the dozens of world leaders he met as the US Secretary of State he found the "most unpleasant" was Chinese President Xi Jinping, who threatened to stop sending PPF kits to America if it kept asking for accountability from Beijing on Covid-19. In his book titled 'Never Give an Inch: Fighting for the America I Love,' former US Secretary of State Pompeo, 59, writes that he held multiple interactions with the Chinese leader and found him "dour" and a "quintessential Communist apparatchik". He writes that Xi told stories about Chinese victimhood and talked about his "demands to avenge grievances from long before any of us were born. "Personally, I thought Xi was dour. While Putin can be funny and mirthful, even while being evil, Xi was not so serious as dead-eyed. I never once saw an unforced smile, Pompeo writes in the book that hit the bookstores on Tuesday. I also found Xi a quintessential Communist apparatchik: heavy in the abstract, light on the issu
Ashraf Ghani, the former Afghanistan President who fled the country when the Taliban grabbed power in Kabul, was a total fraud solely focused on his own desire to stay in power and a big hurdle in any peace talks, former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said. In his book titled 'Never Give an Inch: Fighting for the America I Love,' Pompeo claims that both Ghani and Afghanistan's former chief executive Abdullah Abdullah were involved in corruption at the highest levels that limited the US' ability to successfully exit the war-torn country in August 2021. The United States completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan on August 31, ending its 20-year-old military presence in the country. As negotiations accelerated, Ghani was always a problem. I met scores of world leaders, and he was my least favourite. That's saying a lot when you have Kim (Jong-un), Xi (Jinping), and (Vladimir) Putin in the mix. Yet Ghani was a total fraud who had wasted American lives and was focused solely on hi
Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Sunday (local time) backed growing calls for a boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics next year over human rights issues in China."The CCP has disappeared reporters writing about Wuhan virus, docs telling the truth about CCP labs, a prof tennis player, Uighurs, Hong Kongers & the head of Interpol. Let's disappear the Olympics from them and hold it in a place the world can be proud of. #BoycottBeijingOlympics," Pompeo tweeted.This comes a few days after US President Joe Biden said that his administration was considering a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.Asked about the possibility of the boycott during an Oval Office meeting with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada, Biden responded that it was "something we are considering", NBC News reported.The White House usually sends a delegation to the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympics but under a diplomatic boycott, they would not send the delegation. ...