Huntsman Would Have 'Impossible' Mission as Russia Ambassador

Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman would have “an impossible job," if confirmed as the new U.S. ambassador to Russia, Max Bergmann, a senior fellow on U.S.-Russian policy at the liberal Center for American Progress, tells The Salt Lake Tribune.

In an interview published Monday, Bergmann, who served as an adviser to former Secretary of State John Kerry, said to the newspaper:

"In the case of Russia, there is no unified direction in terms of policy where we have the State Department, the Defense Department in one place, you can count Nikki Haley as U.N. ambassador in there.

"Then we have the president who is clearly in a different space of where the relationship in Russia should be."

"It's not a job that — while I commend him for stepping up to the challenge — it's not a job that I think he's probably going to be able to exercise effectively."

Huntsman, 56, served as the 16th governor of Utah from 2005 to 2009, and as U.S. ambassador to Singapore from 1992 to 1993, and China from 2009 to 2011.

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