Rex Tillerson has been sacked as the US Secretary of State - but why was the oil and gas tycoon fired and did he really call his boss Donald Trump a 'moron'?
US President Donald Trump has sacked Secretary of State Rex Tillerson just hours after he blamed Russia for spy poison attack in Salisbury.
Tillerson has been replaced with Mike Pompeo, the director of the CIA.
Tillerson was born on March 23, 1952, in Wichita Falls, Texas.
He is the son of Patty Sue and Bobby Joe.
As a youth, he was a high-achieving scout and served as president of the Boy Scouts of America from 2010 to 2012.
He is the former director of the United Negro College Fund, a US organisation that funds scholarships for black students and supports historically black colleges and universities.
He was appointed Secretary of State on February 1, 2017.
Although no official reason has been given the announcement by Trump comes just hours after Tillerson blamed Russia for the spy poison attack in Salisbury.
In a tweet, Donald Trump wrote: "Mike Pompeo, Director of the CIA, will become our new Secretary of State. He will do a fantastic job!
"Thank you to Rex Tillerson for his service! Gina Haspel will become the new Director of the CIA, and the first woman so chosen.
"Congratulations to all!"
In a further statement, he added: "Finally, I want to thank Rex Tillerson for his service. A great deal has been accomplished over the last fourteen months, and I wish him and his family well."
In a statement, Tillerson revealed he had "every intention of staying" in his post, saying: "The Secretary did not speak to the President and is unaware of the reason, but he is grateful for the opportunity to serve, and still believes strongly that public service is a noble calling."
Tillerson and Trump have disagreed on a number of other issues, including the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement, the administration’s talks with North Korea, a dispute among Persian Gulf countries and the Paris climate accord.
On October 4 2017 Tillerson called a press conference to deny that he had been on the brink of resigning as US secretary of state during the summer - but was more evasive when asked if it was true that he had called President Trump a moron.
He said: "The vice-president [Mike Pence] has never had to persuade me to remain as secretary of state because I have never considered leaving this post."
The hastily arranged news conference came after NBC News reported that Mr Tillerson, a Texan former oil executive, had grown so frustrated with Mr Trump over the summer that he had been at the point of quitting.
Tensions were said to have peaked in July as Mr Trump's security advisers tried to thrash out a policy on Afghanistan and the West Wing endured a series of controversies, most of them set in motion by the president.
After a meeting at the Pentagon on July 20, Mr Tillerson allegedly openly disparaged Mr Trump, referring to him as a moron, three officials told NBC.
Mr Tillerson said of Mr Trump: "He loves this country. He puts Americans and America first. He's smart. He demands results wherever he goes and he holds those around him accountable."
However, when asked if NBC's claim that he had called Mr Trump a moron was accurate, he replied: "We don't deal with that kind of petty nonsense."
A few hours later, the state department called another press conference formally to deny that Mr Tillerson had called the president a moron.
"He did not say that," a spokeswoman said.
Tillerson earned a bachelor of science degree in civil engineering at the University of Texas at Austin before joining Exxon Company,U.S.A. in 1975 as a production engineer.
He then became CEO of Exxon Mobil, a publicly traded oil firm, and oversaw operations in more than 50 countries, including Russia.
In 2011, Exxon Mobil signed a deal with Rosneft – Russia‘s largest state-owned oil company – for joint oil exploration and production.
Since then, the companies have formed 10 joint ventures for projects in Russia.
In 2013, the Kremlin bestowed the country’s Order of Friendship honour on the oil boss – who went on to argue against sanctions at a shareholders’ meeting the following year.
“We do not support sanctions, generally, because we don’t find them to be effective unless they are very well implemented comprehensively and that’s a very hard thing to do,” he said.
Tillerson added: “We always encourage the people who are making those decisions to consider the very broad collateral damage of who are they really harming with sanctions."
One of ExxonMobil’s biggest deals in Russia – worth a reported $500billion (£398billion) fell victim to sanctions imposed by the Obama administration after Putin’s 2014 invasion of Crimea.
We pay for your stories! Do you have a story for The Sun Online news team? Email us at [email protected] or call 0207 782 4368. We pay for videos too. Click here to upload yours.
