Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is Losing It

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was backed into a rather uncomfortable corner during an interview with Mary Louise Kelly on NPR’s Morning Edition. Although Pompeo wanted to stick to the topic of Iran, Kelly pivoted to the Ukraine scandal and specifically wanted to know how he responded to criticism from State Department personnel who resigned after Pompeo failed to back U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch while she was being targeted by nefarious characters outside the U.S. government while she was doing her assigned work combatting corruption in Ukraine. Time and time again, Pompeo insisted he’d defended all State Department personnel. A blatant lie, one he struggled to defend.

    MARY LOUISE KELLY: People who work for you in your department, people who have resigned from this department under your leadership, saying you should stand up for the diplomats who work here.”

    MIKE POMPEO: I...I...I don’t know— I don’t know who these unnamed sources are you’re referring to. I can tell you this—

    MARY LOUISE KELLY: These are not unnamed sources. This is your senior advisor Michael McKinley, a career foreign service officer with four decades experience who testified under oath that he resigned in part due to the failure of the State Department to offer support for foreign service employees caught up in the impeachment inquiry on Ukraine.

    MIKE POMPEO: I’m not going to comment on things that Mr. McKinley may have said. I’ll say only this. I have defended every State Department official. We’ve built a great team. The team that works here is doing amazing work around the world—

    MARY LOUISE KELLY: Sir, respectfully, where have you defended Marie Yovanovitch?

    MIKE POMPEO: I’ve defended every single person on this team. I’ve done what’s right for every single person on this team.

    MARY LOUISE KELLY: Can you point me toward your remarks where you have defended Marie Yovanovitch?

    MIKE POMPEO: I’ve said all I’m going to say today. Thank you.

Additional reports have now surfaced that Pompeo berated Kelly after the mics were off. CNN’s Daniel Dale reports that Kelly said she was taken to Pompeo’s “private living room,” where he proceeded to shout at her for the “same amount of time as the interview itself.” He reportedly dropped an f-bomb, then asked her if she really believed “Americans care about Ukraine?” This was followed by him having a staffer bring in a map, and asking Kelly to prove to him that she knew where Ukraine was.   Putting Pompeo in his place, Kelly quickly did so.   He replied, "People will hear about this!"

This isn’t the first time Pompeo has freaked out when asked simple questions. Back in October 2019, Pompeo got pissed off at Wichita KMUV reporter as well as a reporter at the Wichita Eagle, calling their reasonable questions concerning disparaging remarks about State Department employees made by Trump and Pence, “insane.”  This was just two weeks after he went off on a local reporter in Nashville.

We already know that Pompeo is an accomplished liar-- now it looks as if he has become an unstable one. The American people, and most especially our foreign service officers, deserve someone of the highest ethical and moral standards leading the State Department.