WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a member of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee and one of the Senate’s most vocal critics of the U.S.-Saudi relationship, on Wednesday voted for retired Army General John Abizaid to be the U.S. Ambassador to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Murphy has criticized the Trump administration for keeping these important diplomatic positions vacant for so long and has been urging the administration to name qualified nominees to fill these positions. 

“It's absolutely baffling to me that it took two years for President Trump to nominate someone qualified to be U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia. General Abizaid is a solid choice, and while I strongly disagree with this administration's weak, backwards policy toward Saudi Arabia, I'm glad that we finally have an Ambassador on the ground there,” said Murphy. 

Yesterday, Murphy questioned U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during a U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs hearing and pressed Pompeo on the administration’s refusal to comply with the Global Magnitsky Act in regards to the role of Saudi Arabia following the death of Washington Post journalist and U.S. resident Jamal Khashoggi. In October, Murphy joined his colleagues on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations and Appropriations Committees in sending a letter to President Trump to trigger an investigation pursuant to the Global Magnitsky Act into the disappearance of the Saudi journalist.

Since 2015, Murphy has been a vocal critic of the United States’ support for the Saudi-led civil war in Yemen, and has called on his colleagues to pass legislation to end U.S. military involvement. Recently, the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution authored by Murphy, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and U.S. Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) to end U.S. involvement in the Saudi-led war in Yemen pursuant to the War Powers Act with broad bipartisan support. 

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