Dodd Urges Bolton Withdraw As U.N. Nominee

WASHINGTON – President Bush’s choice to be America’s ambassador to the United Nations should withdraw from consideration or risk embarrassing the president, a Senate Democrat said yesterday. The White House said it stood by John Bolton.A Republican colleague said “it’s too close to call” whether the Senate will confirm Mr. Bolton, who awaits a vote by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on May 12.“I think the best policy is to have his nomination come to the full Senate, not decided by a committee, because the Constitution says that advice and consent are the province of the Senate itself,” said Senator Specter, a Republican of Pennsylvania, on CNN’s “Late Edition.”One committee member, Senator Dodd, a Democrat of Connecticut, was asked if he thought Mr. Bolton should withdraw from consideration. “I would hope he would,” Mr. Dodd told CBS’s “Face the Nation.”“I think he’s going to embarrass the president. I think he’s going to … have a very difficult job serving if he’s confirmed narrowly by the Senate. He should withdraw or the president ought to withdraw this nomination.There are plenty of other good people who embrace his ideological views who can go up” and achieve the major changes that Mr. Bush is pressing for at the United Nations. “John Bolton is not that individual.”A White House spokeswoman, Christie Parell, said the president is sticking by Mr. Bolton. “The president believes he’s exactly the man needed at the United Nations,” she said yesterday in response to Mr. Dodd’s remark.Mr. Bolton has come under fire over allegations he dressed down subordinates or behaved, as one former colleague claimed, “like a madman,” when he was crossed. In addition, there is unease over Mr. Bolton’s past hostility toward the United Nations and accusations that he tried to pressure career intelligence analysts into twisting facts for political reasons.Senator Durbin of Illinois, the second-ranking Democrat, told “Fox News Sunday” that he thought Mr. Bolton’s nomination was “in trouble.”Defenders said Mr. Bolton, now the undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, has a tough talking style that will help achieve needed reforms at the United Nations.“Look, we’re not nominating somebody here for Miss Congeniality,” said Senator McConnell, a Republican of Kentucky. “We know that Bolton is a person, a forceful person, a person of strong opinion.”But Senator Biden, the top Democrat on the committee, said he was concerned about allegations Mr. Bolton tried to intimidate intelligence analysts and, in some cases, sought to have them fired. “The only relevance of temperament here …that goes beyond these other questions is not whether he’s a nice guy or not,” Mr. Biden, a Democrat of Delaware, told ABC’s “This Week.”

Dodd Urges Bolton Withdraw As U.N. Nominee

Dodd Urges Bolton Withdraw As U.N. Nominee

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