The long-simmering tensions between President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson came to a head Tuesday, when the commander-in-chief announced the ouster of the country’s top diplomat with a tweet.
One political analyst told Cheddar the move was telling.
“It speaks a lot to the character of the two men,” commentator Rick Wilson said. “When Donald Trump was selling steaks, vodka, and a fake university, Rex Tillerson was building Exxon into the largest energy company in the world.
“The anxiety that Trump has about Tillerson being more competent than him has finally played itself out.”
Tillerson reportedly found out about his firing after Trump took to Twitter to announce that CIA Director Mike Pompeo would take over at the State Department.
The president later said he and the former ExxonMobil CEO “were not really thinking the same,” but that Pompeo had a “similar thought process.”
Still, the decision to remove Tillerson came hours after he voiced his support of UK Prime Minister Theresa May and the British government, who on Monday said Russia was likely behind the poisoning of an ex-Moscow spy.
The Trump administration did not officially second those findings.
But Wilson said Tillerson was right to consider Russia “an imminent national security threat.”
“Donald Trump doesn’t see it that way,” he told Cheddar. “There’s something wrong about Donald Trump’s relationship and viewpoint about Vladimir Putin that makes him behave this way, even when serious and consequential people around him are warning him.”
The White House denied Tillerson’s dismissal had anything to do with Russia, instead saying it wanted to have new leadership in place before Trump’s meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, expected this spring.
For the full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/no-collusion-and-tillerson-is-out).
As President Biden travels to Europe this week amid Russia's ongoing invasion of its neighbor Ukraine, former Obama campaign foreign policy advisor and former Bush administration State Department official David Tafuri, joined Cheddar News to discuss the president's stop in Brussels, Belgium, to coordinate with NATO leaders efforts to dissuade Russian President Putin's war. "The maintenance of sanctions and increasingly ratcheting up the sanctions is what he thinks will cause a country like Russia to back off," Tafuri said of Biden. "And so he's committed to that strategy."
John Logan, Director of Labor and Employment Studies at San Francisco State University, joined Cheddar News to discuss the growing unionization push by employees at Starbucks and Amazon, and the wider implications of employee organization at these big companies.
Cheddar's Arielle Hixson sat down with five Black women making history as part of the Biden administration's communications team. Karine Jean-Pierre, the principal deputy press secretary; Khanya Brann, the chief of staff to Kate Bedingfield; Amanda Finney, the chief of staff to Jen Psaki; Erica Loewe, the director of African American media; and Rykia Dorsey, the senior regional communications director, shared their stories.
President Biden has embarked on a crucial trip to meet with allies in Belgium and Poland to discuss new sanctions on Russia as it continues to wage war on Ukraine. The president will seek to address the growing humanitarian crisis out of Ukraine, demonstrate a united Western front against Russia, and reassure Ukraine that it has support from the U.S. Joel Rubin, Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State & President of the Washington Strategy Group, breaks down what to expect from the President's crucial visit to Europe.
Catching you up on what you need to know Mar 24, 2022, with NATO meeting updates, Ukraine retaking suburbs around Kyiv, the spread of omicron subvariant BA.2 in China, Google Pay launching a third-party billing option, and a 16-year-old is suspected of being the Lapsus$ mastermind behind hacks of Microsoft and others.
The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits last week fell to its lowest level in 52 years as the U.S. job market continues to show strength in the midst of rising costs and an ongoing virus pandemic.
Alicia Garza joined Cheddar News to talk about the Black Futures Lab where serves as founder and principal. The non-profit organization seeks to develop grassroots power in the Black community with projects like the Black Census, which takes into account the granular experiences of the demographic. "What we know about Black folks and the reason that we decided to focus on black communities again, it's because we're being left out and left behind their stories being told about us without our input and without our shaping," she said. "If we want a robust democracy in this country, we have to change that equation." Garza also touched on issues around voter suppression and the midterm elections.
Sean O'Hara, President of Pacer ETF's, explains why investors who were down after Jerome Powell's remarks on inflation Monday were more optimistic on Tuesday as the major indexes ended the day near session highs.
