WASHINGTON – US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo named Fox commentator Morgan Ortagus as the new spokesman for his department on Wednesday, replacing Heather Nauert, who had also worked for the conservative network.
Ortagus resigned from his job at Fox last week when his name already sounded to join the Donald Trump government.
Aged 36, Ortagus worked during Barack Obama’s Government (2009-2017) as an intelligence analyst for the Treasury Department, being assigned in 2010 to the US Embassy in Saudi Arabia.
According to Fox News, his job was to “identify and designate terrorists” to be included in the list of United Nations sanctions.
Previously, in 2007, still with George W. Bush (2001-2009) in the White House, Ortagus was hired as a spokesperson for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID, in English), working for months in Baghdad.
After leaving the public sector, Ortagus founded the advisory firm GO Advisors and registered as a reservist for the US Navy.
Ortagus also worked as a commentator for Fox News, which has become a quarry for government officials in Trump’s White House, which he has recognized as his favorite chain.
During the 2016 election campaign, Ortagus was part of a committee linked to former Florida governor Jeb Bush, one of Trump’s rivals in the Republican primary.
In several television appearances during the initial phase of those primaries, Ortegus called Trump “disgusting” for his mockery of the disabled, said he was not “serious” and criticized his foreign agenda, which he described as “isolationist”.
“Frankly, I do not want someone with the temperament of a pubescent high school boy in the president’s office,” he said, precisely to Fox News Radio.
The new spokeswoman will replace Nauert, the Fox News representative who arrived at the State Department with Rex Tillerson as secretary in 2017.
At the end of last year, Trump chose Nauert to replace as United States ambassador to the United Nations the influential Nikki Haley, who for many exerted as a true representative of US diplomacy and who resigned from his post.
Nauert, however, withdrew his candidacy in mid-February, before passing the scrutiny of the Senate for confirmation, citing “family reasons.”
American media reported then that the real reason for his step back was because Nauert had hired a nanny who did not have permission to work in the United States.
The foreign spokeswoman has gained importance in the Trump government since the president ordered his spokesman, Sarah Sanders, to stop giving the traditional daily press conferences in their permanent confrontation with the media.
Sanders offered his last press conference on March 11, 42 days after the previous one, which was on January 28. (EFEUSA)
