The diplomat slated to be the next U.S. Ambassador to Libya has withdrawn her name from the process as the Senate has been slow-walking the nomination process.
Jennifer Gavito was nominated by President Joe Biden in January, but Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee have stalled discussing the appointments of Gavito and 25 other career diplomats. They have stalled the process due to a disagreement with fellow committee Democrats about an unrelated bill on the International Criminal Court, which accuses Israel and Hamas of war crimes in Gaza, according to Punch Bowl.
“Last week, I asked that President Biden withdraw my nomination as US Ambassador to Libya,” Gavito wrote on LinkedIn.
Gavito said the State Department first approached her about the position more than 2 1/2 years ago. The Senate received her nomination nine months ago.
“US national security deserves better than this. There has been no US ambassador in Libya for two years, ceding space to Russia and China who have actively sought to exploit our perceived absence and destabilise Nato’s southern flank,” she continued.
While the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is typically bipartisan in nature, it has been entangled in disagreements for months, mainly on Israel’s war against Hamas.
The Foreign Relations Committee was set to meet last week, but it fell through.
Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID), the panel’s top Republican, has refused to sign off on a committee-wide meeting to consider nominations and legislation. He is holding out until Democrats agree to add the sanctions bill against the ICC to the agenda, which was passed in the House.
Committee Chairman Ben Cardin (D-MD) disagreed with this choice to add the bill but did so, pointing to the backlog of State Department nominees, most of which are ambassadorships, and looking to move past the standstill.
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Still, Senate Democrats ended up removing the ICC sanctions bill from the agenda markup. Republicans countered that move by withdrawing their agreement to have the meeting.
Because Congress is out of session until Nov. 12, the committee will not meet until after the election.