Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani is firming as the leading candidate to be Republican President-elect Donald Trump’s secretary of state, a source familiar with the situation says.
The source said John Bolton, who served as US ambassador to the United Nations under President George W Bush, was also under consideration to head the State Department.
Besides Mr Giuliani and Mr Bolton, former US House of Representatives Speaker Newt Gingrich has also been reported as a possible secretary of state.
Mr Giuliani, a vocal supporter of Mr Trump during his presidential campaign against Democrat Hillary Clinton, had previously been reported as a candidate for attorney-general.
Meanwhile, Mr Trump has jettisoned a respected national security expert from his transition team in a sign that he may be settling on loyalists such as Mr Giuliani and conservative ideologues such as Mr Bolton to staff his administration.
Mike Rogers, a former US congressman from Michigan who headed the House of Representatives intelligence committee, said he was leaving the transition team.
His sudden departure was announced four days after New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was abruptly replaced as the head of Mr Trump’s transition team by Vice President-elect Mike Pence.
Mr Giuliani, New York’s mayor at the time of the September 11, 2001, attacks by Islamist al-Qaeda militants, is known as a hard-liner on national security matters.
Mr Bolton is also a foreign policy hawk who said last year the United States should bomb Iran to halt its nuclear program.
With fewer than 70 days until his January 20 inauguration, the Republican president-elect has little time to settle on Cabinet members and other senior appointees.
Progress on Trump team slow
Mr Trump, who had never previously run for office until his surprise victory over Ms Clinton last week, will eventually need to fill about 4000 open positions.
Mr Pence has not yet filled out paperwork required by law to work on the transition with Democratic President Barack Obama’s outgoing administration, the White House said.
Two national security officials said Mr Trump’s operation had been slow to get up to speed and had not yet deeply engaged with security and intelligence agency personnel who were ready to start helping them out.
A former Republican government official said Rogers’ exit from the transition team was part of a purge of relatively moderate individuals who had worked on the transition with Mr Christie before Mr Pence took over.
Some prominent Republican experts who might be tapped to fill out a Trump administration, meanwhile, were warning colleagues to steer clear.
“After exchange w Trump transition team, changed my recommendation: stay away. They’re angry, arrogant, screaming ‘you LOST!’ Will be ugly,” former State Department official Eliot Cohen wrote on Twitter.
After exchange w Trump transition team, changed my recommendation: stay away. They're angry, arrogant, screaming "you LOST!" Will be ugly.
— Eliot A Cohen (@EliotACohen) November 15, 2016
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