The Democrat trashes an Obama nominee.
Spare a thought for Matthew Bryza, a Presidential appointee who is a victim of election-year politics and parochial ethnic lobbies on Capitol Hill.
Mr. Bryza is a highly accomplished career diplomat who has spent two decades working on the Caucasus and Central Asia. In May, President Obama nominated Mr. Bryza, a deputy assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian affairs in the Bush years, to be U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan. He carries no partisan baggage, and you’d think he’d be waved through the Senate. Yet his confirmation is in jeopardy thanks to California Senator Barbara Boxer’s re-election woes.
The most vocal opposition to Mr. Bryza comes from the Armenian National Committee of America, or ANCA. The influential lobby alleges that Mr. Bryza is biased toward Azerbaijan and Turkey, Armenia’s regional nemeses. As proof, they cite his marriage to Turkish-born Zeyno Baran, a scholar on leave from the Hudson Institute. The ANCA dredges up a few past comments by Mr. Bryza related to the dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh. The diplomat co-chaired the Minsk Group, which is trying to broker peace between the two sides.
These charges were addressed to the satisfaction of most Senators during last month’s confirmation hearings. If anything, Ms. Baran is a prominent critic of Turkey’s government who has published widely, including in these pages. Mr. Bryza enjoys good relations with politicians in Azerbaijan and Armenia, whose government doesn’t oppose his nomination.
That Mr. Bryza is respected by all sides in this turbulent and difficult region is a testament to his diplomatic skills. But he does have a long track record—which most people would see as relevant experience—that the hard line ANCA can use to fight him and, not incidentally, gain attention for its fund raising.
Lucky for them, the three-term Senator Boxer is in danger of losing her seat to Republican challenger Carly Fiorina. The Golden State is home to a large Armenian community, a potential swing bloc this November, and Ms. Boxer is pandering for their votes. Along with New Jersey’s Senator Robert Menendez, who runs the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, she grilled Mr. Bryza in his hearing before the Foreign Relations Committee. She then asked to “bounce” a committee vote on him from last month to tomorrow.
The delay hurts his chances. Even if Mr. Bryza gets out of committee, Ms. Boxer may put a hold on him to stop confirmation by unanimous consent. It’s unlikely the full Senate could schedule a floor vote on his nomination before the campaign recess. The White House has bigger problems than to press an endangered Democratic incumbent on an ambassadorial appointment, and it hasn’t.
Meantime, the ambassador’s office in Baku has been empty for 14 months. This suits the ANCA just fine. The Armenian lobby would love to see America’s ties to the Turkic world weakened. Each year they press Congress to adopt a resolution that the 1915 massacre of ethnic Armenians at the hands of the Ottomans qualifies as a “genocide,” infuriating Turkey.
These tribal Caucasian obsessions threaten U.S. interests. Oil-rich and strategically located between Russia and Iran, Azerbaijan has enjoyed close relations with Washington. Azeri leaders view the absence of an ambassador as a symptom of recent American neglect, a view reinforced by Senator Boxer’s typically political and self-serving games.
Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A22
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