Matthew Whitaker
Donald Trump nominated former acting attorney general and Trump loyalist Matthew Whitaker to be the United States ambassador to NATO on Wednesday. The ambassador serves as a crucial liaison with our foreign allies, who have criticized Trump’s pro-Russia statements and sentiments during the Russia-Ukraine War.
“Matt is a strong warrior and loyal Patriot, who will ensure the United States’ interests are advanced and defended,” Trump said in a statement.
Whitaker is a relic from Trump’s first term, where he began as chief of staff to Attorney General Jeff Sessions before a brief and stormy stint replacing Sessions as acting attorney general. He was in turn replaced by William Barr, then managed to hang on as an adviser in the Justice Department.
But it wouldn’t be a Trump pick without a history of dubiousness.
Whitaker’s 2013 bid for a Senate seat in his home state of Iowa was a failure. But during that campaign he argued that states could “nullify” federal laws—if they had the "courage" to do so. As University of Texas law professor Stephen Vladeck told CNN in 2018, “Nullification as a serious, mainstream legal argument didn’t survive the Civil War (or the constitutional amendments that followed).”
He subsequently served as a “prominent member” on the advisory board for the Miami-based World Patent Marketing, an “invention promotion” company that was accused of defrauding customers. Whitaker was reportedly “slow to respond to government investigators probing it.” A Florida court ultimately ordered World Patent Marketing to pay out a $25 million settlement and agree to close up shop.
After he was publicly critical of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Trump's campaign activities and Russian interference in the 2016 election, Whitaker’s ascension to acting attorney general set off red flags.
This led to Trump telling reporters he didn't know the guy he had just named acting attorney general, contradicting statements he made to Fox News a month earlier, where he described Whitaker as “a great guy,” as well as saying, “I mean, I know Matt Whitaker.” Previous reports also indicated that Whitaker was something of a mole for Trump in the Justice Department.
Whitaker then made a combative appearance in front of the House Judiciary Committee, where he refused to answer questions about his conversations with then-President Trump or the potential for obstructing the special counsel’s investigation. It was later reported that Whitaker left the committee hearing and flew off to Mar-a-Lago for a private chitchat with Trump.
The Daily Beast published a report detailing how Whitaker spent his days in Washington after the Trump administration ended and he retired from the Department of Justice. While not registered as a lobbyist, Whitaker seems to have been paid by a “dark money” group to lobby for presidential pardons.
Whitaker has subsequently been a mouthpiece for the Trump campaign, appearing on right-wing media to hurl accusations against President Joe Biden. In 2023, he told Newsmax that he believed “the Biden family has been corrupt for many many years.”
If approved, Whitaker will join a suspected child sex trafficker, a suspected sexual abuser and white supremacist, a Vladimir Putin sympathizer, an anti-vaxxer whale decapitator, a shady television doctor, and a professional wrestling billionaire Republican donor in Trump’s new cabinet.
He will fit right in.
Reprinted with permission from Daily Kos.
