Rex Tillerson hearing serves as forum for Trump concerns

Senators pressed Rex Tillerson Wednesday over his ties to Russia and to Exxon. But their greater concern seemed to be over whether President-elect Donald Trump would actually undermine the former ExxonMobil CEO he nominated to be his secretary of state.

Would Trumps unpredictability and tendency to veer wildly between different positions, and to communicate without warning or discipline on Twitter allow Tillerson to do his job of representing the United States in meetings with foreign leaders? Would Trump even explain his policies to top officials like his secretary of state, or simply broadcast it in hard-to-interpret fragments as he has done so far? Would foreign governments have more information about Trumps business dealings and vulnerabilities than his own top negotiators?

These and other questions surfaced repeatedly during the more than seven hours of testimony during Tillersons confirmation hearing.

Weve had this election where many things have been said and sometimes in unorthodox ways, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker said at the beginning of the hearing. Not just do world leaders not know where we are but our body politic here does not know.

Julian Assange said "a 14 year old could have hacked Podesta" - why was DNC so careless? Also said Russians did not give him the info!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) 4 January 2017

North Korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the U.S. It won't happen!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) 2 January 2017

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