President-elect Donald Trump praised retired Army Gen. David Petraeus, a former CIA chief whom he is considering to lead the State Department, after the two met privately in New York Monday.
Trump took to his Twitter account after meeting with Petraeus for an hour inside Trump Tower in Manhattan.
Just met with General Petraeus–was very impressed!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 28, 2016
Petraeus spoke to members of the media on his way out of the meeting, and complemented the president-elect for his grasp of the complex issues the country faces internationally.
Saying the meeting “went very well,” Petraeus told pool reporters he and Trump spent roughly an hour together discussing foreign policy.
“I was with him for about an hour. He basically walked us around the world,” Petraeus said. “[Trump] showed a great grasp of a variety of the challenges that are out there and some of the opportunities as well.”
The retired general added: “Very good conversion and we’ll see where it goes from here.”
Petraeus graduated from West Point in 1974 and was commissioned into the infantry as a second lieutenant.
After decades of climbing the ranks, he served in Bosnia as part of NATO’s Stabilization Force in the early 2000s, as both assistant chief of staff for operations and deputy commander of the U.S. Joint Interagency Counter-Terrorism Task Force.
He was made a full general in 2007, and was tapped by President George W. Bush to lead the successful military “surge” in Iraq.
In 2011, Petraeus was chosen by President Obama to replace Leon Panetta as the director of the CIA; however, he resigned a year later after it was discovered he mishandled classified information during an extramarital affair.
He reached a plea deal and was sentenced to two years of probation and ordered to pay a $100,000 fine.
Trump is slated to meet with two other State Department candidates on Tuesday. The president-elect will sit down with U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker, and will hold a second meeting with 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney.
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