Kelly Craft formally nominated to UN post

President Donald Trump announced his intention to nominate Craft, the current US ambassador to Canada, to the post in late February after former Ambassador Nikki Haley resigned last year.

The nomination now goes to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Craft will begin meeting with senators in coming days and make her case in a hearing at a date to be determined.

The Kentucky native and her husband, billionaire coal mining executive Joe Craft, have been heavyweight Republican funders. In the 2016 presidential race, they backed Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida to be the Republican nominee for president before switching their allegiance to Trump.

The next year, Trump nominated Craft to be ambassador to Canada, a position she officially assumed in October 2017.

Trump's original pick to replace Haley, Heather Nauert, bowed out after it came to light that she had employed a nanny who was legally present in the US but wasn't legally permitted to work.

A former US ambassador who served in the State Department under both Republican and Democratic administrations expressed concern to CNN about Trump's most recent nominees.

"When you look at the others who have held‎ this position -- Henry Cabot Lodge, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Madeleine Albright, George H.W. Bush -- these were people who knew so much. They could call heads of state, and sit down, and do the hard negotiations. Now, though -- these choices -- people at State see this as terrible."