Secretary of State Rex Tillerson appeared at the State Department on Wednesday morning to give a brief statement on his own statements. In a six minute apologia, followed by a short question and answer session, Tillerson denied that he needed the reported pep talk from Mike Pence to stay on the team. In fact, despite numerous articles spread across many months, and public disputes that included Tillerson leaving town to sulk, the former Exxon CEO reports that he “never considered” leaving his position at the State Department.
In fact, Tillerson denied almost everything—except he never denied that he called Donald Trump a “moron.”
As part of his announcement, Tillerson said he had found Trump to be “very smart,” but pressed by reporters to give a definitive statement on his previous statements, Tillerson would only dodge away with a …
"I'm not going to deal with this petty stuff." …
“I’m not going to deal with petty points like that.”
Tillerson said that dwelling on minor things like calling Trump a moron was simply an attempt to divide Team Trump. The speech included a hearty round of explaining how the entire Trump team was composed of super-friends whose achievements in foreign relations consisted of … nothing. But they’re working on it.
It seems to have pleased Trump … so far.
Odds that Pence and Tillerson are being more accurate than NBC’s sources … low. Odds that Trump will genuinely let this go with that “moron” still hanging out there… nonexistent.