WASHINGTON (AP) — Mike Huckabee, President Donald Trump's nominee for U.S. ambassador to Israel, attempted to distance himself Tuesday from his past controversial statements about the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people, pledging on Capitol Hill to “carry out the president's priorities, not mine.”
“I am not here to articulate or defend my own views or policies, but to present myself as one who will respect and represent the President whose overwhelming election by the people will hopefully give me the honor of serving as ambassador to the State of Israel,” Huckabee said in his opening statement.
Trump nominated Huckabee, a well-known evangelical Christian and vehement supporter of Israel, to take on the critical post in Jerusalem days after he won reelection on a campaign promise to end the now 17-month war in Gaza. But after a brief ceasefire, U.S. and Arab mediators are now struggling to get a ceasefire deal back on track after Israeli forces resumed the war last week with a surprise wave of deadly airstrikes.
While Republican senators applauded Huckabee's staunch support for America's closest ally, Israel, Democrats questioned his past rhetoric about Palestinians deemed “extreme” by even some pro-Israel groups and contradicting longstanding U.S. policy in the region.
The former Arkansas governor acknowledged his past support for Israel’s right to annex the West Bank and incorporate its Palestinian population into Israel but said it would not be his “prerogative” to carry out that policy.
“If confirmed, it will be my responsibility to carry out the president’s priorities, not mine,” Huckabee said in response to Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley's questions.
Huckabee, a one-time presidential hopeful, has also repeatedly backed referring to the West Bank by its biblical name of “Judea and Samaria,” a term that right-wing Israeli politicians and activists have thus far fruitlessly pushed the U.S. to accept. He did not give a clear answer to whether he still stands by that when pushed by Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.
Most notably, Huckabee has long been opposed to the idea of a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinian people. In an interview last year, he went even further, saying that he doesn't even believe in referring to the Arab descendants of people who lived in British-controlled Palestine as “Palestinians.”
As the situation in Gaza has deteriorated with the recent collapse of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire and hostage release deal, Israeli officials have begun to talk more seriously about reoccupation of the territory, something to which President Joe Biden's administration had been adamantly opposed.
Trump has made his proposals about a potential U.S. takeover of Gaza, which have attracted attention as well as strong criticism from Arab nations and others. When asked about Trump's plan, Huckabee denied that the president ever said he would “force displacement" of Palestinians from Gaza “unless it is for their safety” and says Palestinians could be incentivized to leave.
Even before his hearing started, Democrats and some pro-Israel groups voiced their opposition to his nomination, saying that his views on the conflict are “extreme” and “counter to Americans' interests.”
“Huckabee’s positions are not the words of a thoughtful diplomat — they are the words of a provocateur whose views are far outside international consensus and contrary to the core bipartisan principles of American diplomacy,” Rep. Jerry Nadler, a senior Jewish Democrat, said in a statement Monday. “In one of the most volatile and violent areas in the world today, there is no need for more extremism, and certainly not from the historic ambassador’s post and behind the powerful seal of the United States.”
Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the pro-Israel group J Street, which has previously criticized the Biden and Trump administrations' handling of the war, echoed that sentiment, saying that Huckabee's views “would undermine American interests and the administration’s own stated commitment to pursuit of long-term regional peace and security.”
He added, “Mr. Huckabee’s embrace of annexation, extremist settlers and fanatical Christian Zionism stands in stark contrast to the Jewish, democratic values held by the overwhelming majority of our community — and in stark contrast to Israel’s founding values of justice, equality and peace.”
Another nominee who testified before the committee on Tuesday is Kevin Cabrera, Trump’s pick to be ambassador to Panama, a country that has bristled at the Republican president’s repeated calls for the U.S. to retake control of the Panama Canal for national security reasons due to potential threats from China. The status of the canal was one of the top items on Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s agenda when he visited Panama City on his first trip as America's top diplomat in February.
“One of the key aspects of our cooperation is ensuring the security of the Panama Canal, a critical international waterway that facilitates global trade and economic growth,” Cabrera said in his opening remarks.
He also praised decisions by the Panamanian government to withdraw from China’s Belt and Road Initiative and to review contracts with a China-based company that is running ports at both ends of the canal. The company has preliminarily agreed to sell its interests in the subsidiaries that run the ports, but the deal is not yet complete.
Cabrera also faced repeated calls from Democrats to commit to upholding Panama’s sovereignty and advising the president to do the same, but Cabrera responded that he would defer to Trump, who has said “all the options are on the table” when it comes to asserting U.S. control over the Panama Canal.
He added that diplomacy is included in those options.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said she appreciated a “focus on diplomacy,” but said she was still worried by the threats of sending military force or coercing Panama to relinquish control over the canal.
Cabrera responded, “President Trump is our commander and chief and I stand behind him and his policies.”
Amiri reported from New York.
FILE - Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee gestures as a campaign event at the Drexelbrook Catering & Event Center, Oct. 29, 2024, in Drexel Hill, Pa. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)
The White House has released President Donald Trump's schedule for Monday. He will hold a press conference with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and then begin a weeklong trip to the Middle East. Trump will visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, though his most pressing regional challenges concern two other countries: Israel and Iran.
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The Department of Homeland Security says it is opening an investigation into a California program that pays money to some immigrants.
The Department said Monday that it had issued a subpoena to California’s Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants to obtain records about the program.
That California program was created when Congress in 1996 took away federal Supplemental Security Income assistance for legal immigrants in a welfare reform law.
According to the program’s website, it pays money to elderly, blind and disabled people in California who are not citizens. The website says the program is entirely paid for by California.
The Trump administration has targeted states and communities that it considers to be lax when it comes to immigration enforcement.
Fresh off a 90-day tariff rollback to hold talks with China, President Donald Trump said that on trade issues, the “European Union is in many ways nastier than China.”
Trump said while speaking on Monday at the White House that the EU would “come down a lot” on trade restrictions regarding the U.S., tearing into the longstanding ally. The U.S. president insisted that America has “all the cards” in trade talks with Europe because of the vehicles it buys from the continent’s automakers.
Trump said his executive order on pharmaceutical drug prices would mean that Europeans will have “to pay more for health care, and we’re going to have to pay less.”
The U.S. has a separate negotiating period on trade in which goods from the EU are being charged 10% import taxes.
Trump said that the U.S.-Israeli citizen was expected to be released by Hamas in the “next two hours” or “sometime today.”
“He’s coming home to his parents, which is really great news,” Trump told reporters at the White House shortly before he was scheduled to depart for a whirlwind visit to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and United Arab Emirates.
Trump credited his special envoy Steve Witkoff in helping win the release of Alexander, 21.
The president said that Witkoff, a New York real estate developer turned diplomat, knew “very little about the subject matter” but learned quickly.
“He has a special way about him,” Trump said of Witkoff.
President Donald Trump says he will likely speak with China’s leader Xi Jinping “maybe at the end of the week.”
That’s after negotiators from the U.S. and China meeting in Switzerland this weekend agreed to reduce tariffs for 90 days of talks. The import taxes on China imposed by the U.S. would still remain higher than when Trump took office at 30%.
Trump told reporters on Monday that the reduced tariff rates didn’t include tariffs on autos, steel and aluminum as well as the potentially upcoming import taxes on pharmaceutical drugs.
Trump said he also spoke with Apple CEO Tim Cook on Monday and he expected the tech company to make additional commitments to invest in domestic production.
Trump said the talks would be great for “unification and peace.”
Trump says the countries ended hostilities for a lot of reasons “but trade is a big one.”
Speaking at the White House on Monday, the president said the U.S. is already negotiating a trade deal with India and will soon start negotiating with Pakistan.
India and Pakistan reached an understanding to stop all military actions on land, in the air and at the sea Saturday in a U.S.-brokered ceasefire to stop the escalating hostilities between the two nuclear-armed rivals that threatened regional peace.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent praised the progress made in in trade talks with Chinese officials over the weekend and said he expects another meeting in a few weeks.
U.S. and China announced a 90-day pause on tariffs after the weekend talks in Geneva.
“We had a plan, we had a process and now what we have with the Chinese is a mechanism to avoid an upward tariff pressure like we did last time,” Bessent said on CNBC.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller says the Trump administration is looking for ways to expand its legal power to deport migrants who are in the United States illegally.
To achieve that, he says the administration is “actively looking at” suspending habeas corpus, the constitutional right for people to legally challenge their detention by the government.
Such a move would be aimed at migrants as part of the Republican president’s broader crackdown at the U.S.-Mexico border.
“The Constitution is clear, and that of course is the supreme law of the land, that the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus can be suspended in a time of invasion,” Miller told reporters outside the White House on Friday.
“So, I would say that’s an option we’re actively looking at,” Miller said. “Look, a lot of it depends on whether the courts do the right thing or not.”
Trump’s plan to change the pricing model for some medications is already facing fierce criticism from the pharmaceutical industry before he’s even signed the executive order set for Monday that, if implemented, could lower the cost of some drugs.
Trump has promised that his plan — which is likely to tie the price of medications covered by Medicare and administered in a doctor’s office to the lowest price paid by other countries — will significantly lower drug costs.
But the nation’s leading pharmaceutical lobby on Sunday pushed back, calling it a “bad deal” for American patients. Drugmakers have long argued that any threats to their profits could impact the research they do to develop new drugs.
The White House has released President Donald Trump's schedule for Monday. Trump is scheduled to hold a press conference with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at the White House at 9:30 a.m. Trump says he’ll sign an executive order that, if implemented, could bring down the costs of some medications — reviving a failed effort from his first term on an issue he’s talked up since even before becoming president.
Shortly after, Trump will begin his weeklong trip to the Middle East. Trump will visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, though his most pressing regional challenges concern two other countries: Israel and Iran.
President Donald Trump is ready to accept a luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet as a gift from the ruling family of Qatar during his trip to the Middle East this coming week, and U.S. officials say it could be converted into a potential presidential aircraft.
The Qatari government said a final decision hadn’t been made. Still, Trump defended the idea — what would amount to a president accepting an astonishingly valuable gift from a foreign government — as a fiscally smart move for the country.
FILE - President Donald Trump speaks with reporters as he signs executive orders in the Oval Office at the White House, Feb. 10, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, file)
