This is a good opportunity to say a few words about Fiona Hill, who has been a @BrookingsInst colleague for many years.
Fiona is a formidable person—a first-rate mind with genuine and unusual expertise in Russia policy.
Fiona is a formidable person—a first-rate mind with genuine and unusual expertise in Russia policy.
She was not a Trumpist, in any sense, which made her decision to go into the administration a matter of some surprise among her colleagues. For a serious Russia hand to serve in Trump’s NSC was, after all, quite a leap.
I am sure that Fiona has had to make compromises as a result of the contradictions inherent in that decision. (Imagine being a serious Russia person on the NSC during and after Helsinki, for example).
But it should be impossible to dismiss Fiona’s testimony as that of a Never Trumper. This is someone who was not a career bureaucrat who was willing—to the confusion of much of her professional cohort—to go into government in a political role to serve under Trump *on Russia.*
One other thing—a warning to the cocky Republican member who may try to be patronizing or think he or she is gonna have a good C-SPAN moment at Fiona’s expense: Fiona is smarter than you. She knows more. And she is impatient with idiocy. You are likely to embarrass yourself.
