WASHINGTON — Rep. Elise Stefanik is likely to face questions at her confirmation hearing on Tuesday to become the about her lack of foreign policy experience, her strong support for Israel and her views on funding the U.N. and its many agencies.
Harvard-educated and the fourth-ranking member of the U.S. House, she was elected to Congress in 2015 as a moderate Republican and is leaving a decade later as one of President Donald Trump’s most ardent allies. She embraced Trump after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol as he denied he lost the election to Joe Biden.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “looks forward to working again with President Trump on his second term,” U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said Monday.
When Trump announced her appointment, his former national security adviser, John Bolton, told The Associated Press that he sees Stefanik as the new version of Trump’s U.N. ambassador in his first administration — . Haley went on to challenge him, unsuccessfully, for the GOP nomination last year.
Stefanik “wants to run for president in 2028,” said Bolton, who also served as U.S. ambassador to the U.N. in the Bush administration. “She realizes she has no foreign policy experience, so what better way than to become U.N. ambassador. She stays two years, and then away we go.”
When she appears before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Stefanik is likely to be grilled about her views on the , , Sudan and elsewhere as well as the and — all issues on the U.N. agenda.
The United States pays about one-fifth of the U.N.’s regular budget, and she is expected to be questioned about her comments on cutting the U.N. budget and continuing support for its multiple agencies. They tackle everything from health, education and migration to reproductive rights and nuclear proliferation.
Stefanik saw her profile rise after her aggressive questioning last year of a trio of university presidents about antisemitism on their campuses, leading to two of their resignations — a performance Trump repeatedly praised.
She has been very vocal about supporting Israel, especially since the Hamas cross-border attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, in which militants killed about 1,200 people and took some 250 hostage. It led to the Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza, where a ceasefire that the U.S. helped broker has taken hold.
Stefanik has accused the U.N. of being a “den of antisemitism” for criticizing Israel’s air and ground attacks on Gaza, which have resulted in more than 46,000 Palestinian deaths, according to local health officials. They do not distinguish between civilians and militants but say make up more than half the dead.
If confirmed, Stefanik said she plans to confront what she says is antisemitism at the world body.
Her limited foreign policy experience is almost certain to come up among senators. She recently served as a member of the House Armed Services Committee and on the coveted House committee that oversees national intelligence.
Born and raised in upstate New York, Stefanik worked in then-President George W. Bush’s White House on the domestic policy council and in the chief of staff’s office.
She was the youngest person in her freshman class in Congress — just 30 — and ascended to the House leadership team in 2021, becoming the only woman.
Unlike , who is expected to glide through Senate confirmation to be secretary of state, no Democrats have publicly backed Stefanik’s confirmation thus far.
But like Rubio, she is benefiting from being considered by the Senate at the same time as several of Trump’s controversial Cabinet picks.
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Lederer reported from the United Nations.
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