AMBASSADOR/NOMINATIONS/SOUTH KOREA/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/TRUMP POSITION CHANGES: “The Trump administration is searching for a new candidate to be the ambassador to South Korea, after U.S. officials said Tuesday [1-30-18] that its previous pick, Victor Cha, is no longer under consideration.
The Trump administration notified the South Korean government in December that Mr. Cha would be its envoy to Seoul, but weeks passed without a formal nomination. Officials familiar with the decision said Tuesday that the Trump administration dropped him from consideration, though it remains unclear why. In an op-ed published Tuesday night in The Washington Post, Mr. Cha, who was a White House National Security Council expert on Asia during the George W. Bush administration, wrote that he differed with the Trump administration over how to handle North Korea…
But two administration officials told The Wall Street Journal that policy differences may not have been the only reason he was ruled out as the U.S. ambassador to Seoul. One official said that the decision to drop him from consideration was made during the vetting process. The official declined to provide additional information.
Mr. Cha, who is now a Georgetown University professor, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
This means the U.S. almost certainly won’t have an ambassador in place ahead of the Winter Olympics in South Korea in February, contrary to what South Korea had previously expected[.]”
-Felicia Schwartz, “U.S. No Longer Considering Victor Cha for Ambassador to South Korea,” The Wall Street Journal online, Jan. 30, 2018 09:55pm