Earl Anthony Wayne confirmed as U.S ambassador to Mexico
Thursday, August 4, 2011
The United States Senate has unanimously confirmed Earl Anthony Wayne as the new U.S ambassador to Mexico. He replaces Carlos Pascual, who resigned in March following a dispute with Mexican President Felipe Calderón.
Wayne's nomination had been pending since June, and in late July the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved the nomination. Before the confirmation he said “One of my principal objectives...will be to work with my Mexican and U.S. colleagues to accelerate the implementation of the activities to assure that we are achieving our Mérida objectives.”
Wayne has previously served as the U.S ambassador to Argentina and as the deputy ambassador to Afghanistan.
Speaking about the Senate's choice of Wayne as a candidate for the ambassador's role, Eric Olson, a senior associate at the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars said “They didn’t want a controversial candidate. If you choose someone who is more of a political appointee than a career foreign service officer it can get caught up in the politics of the situation. [With Wayne] you’re not picking someone out of the blue or somebody that the committee is not familiar with."
Sources
- "Updated: Senate Confirms New Ambassador to Mexico" — Texas Tribune, 3 August 2011
- "Senate confirms new ambassador to Mexico" — Reuters, 2 August 2011