Pompeo Confirmed as CIA Director

The US Senate on Monday confirmed Mike Pompeo as CIA director and advanced the nomination of Rex Tillerson to be secretary of state, taking key steps toward filling President Donald Trump’s Cabinet.

Pompeo, a Republican congressman on the House Intelligence Committee, becomes only the third member of Trump’s Cabinet to take his post, as the president’s Republican Party has pushed hard to speed up confirmation of his nominees, AFP reported.

Secretary of Defense James Mattis and Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly were sworn on Inauguration Day on Friday. The Republican-led Senate confirmed Pompeo, a 53-year-old US Army veteran, by a vote of 66 to 32, with significant support from Democrats.

Republicans had hoped to confirm Pompeo on Friday but Democrats balked, arguing that a CIA director has never been put in place on Inauguration Day.

A Senate panel green-lighted Tillerson, the former ExxonMobil chief whose nomination has been a source of controversy in large part because of his lack of government or diplomatic experience.  The move cleared the way for a confirmation vote by the full chamber. The vote in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was 11 to 10, along strict party lines, setting up a period of debate and subsequent vote on an as-yet-undetermined day in the Republican-controlled Senate.

Tillerson received a major boost when Senator Marco Rubio, one of three Republicans who had expressed doubts about him, announced he will support Tillerson for the post despite serious reservations.