WASHINGTON _ President Donald Trump named Robert O'Brien, the State Department's special envoy for hostage affairs, as his national security adviser Wednesday, thrusting the Los Angeles lawyer into the maelstrom of U.S. confrontations with Iran, North Korea, China and other global hotspots.
In addition to those challenges, O'Brien will work for a mercurial president who has already pushed out three national security advisers and often surprises his top staff, setting foreign policy priorities or abruptly issuing orders by tweet.
Trump praised O'Brien as "fantastic" as they stood on the tarmac at Los Angeles International Airport before Trump headed to San Diego on Wednesday. "We know each other well."
"We've had tremendous foreign policy successes," O'Brien said. "And I expect those to continue."
O'Brien will replace John Bolton, who was ousted last week, and immediately face the growing crisis in the Persian Gulf, where the White House has struggled to respond to last Saturday's aerial attack on Saudi Arabia's largest oil processing facility and one of its largest oil fields.
So far, the administration has sent mixed messages. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who flew to Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, described the fiery attack as an "act of war" but then suggested the U.S. response to Iran could be slow in coming.
"We are working to build out a coalition to develop a plan to deter them," Pompeo said. "This is what needs to happen."
Trump tweeted that he had directed Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin to escalate economic sanctions on Iran. It wasn't clear whether the new sanctions would be significantly different from those already in place, which have been squeezing Iran's economy.
Trump told reporters he's still weighing his next move, but he made it clear that he's reluctant to take military action.
"There's the ultimate option and there are options a lot less than that," he said.
At a news conference at the Saudi Defense Ministry in Riyadh, Col. Turki Maliki, a Saudi military spokesman, blamed Tehran for "an assault on the international community and an attempt to disrupt the global economy and the energy industry."
He said 18 explosive-laden drones were fired at the Abqaiq oil facility and that four cruise missiles struck the Khurais oilfield further west. Another three missiles fell short of Abqaiq, he said.
But Maliki did not explicitly say the attack was launched from Iran, which has denied responsibility.
Iran's news service reported that the State Department had not yet issued visas to allow Iran's president, Hassan Rouhani, and foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, to attend the annual United Nations General Assembly gathering in New York next week, and that they might cancel their trip. Rouhani was scheduled to speak next Wednesday, a day after Trump.
Asked about Iran's leaders attending, Trump said, "I would let them come."
Trump's uneven foreign policy will be on full display at the U.N., which he used last year to trumpet his "America First" doctrine.
Despite three splashy meetings, he has failed to persuade North Korea's ruler, Kim Jong Un, to abandon his nuclear weapons arsenal or infrastructure. He also has alienated traditional European allies with his outreach to Russia, and he's embroiled in a punishing trade war with China.
The White House national security adviser, who does not require Senate confirmation, typically synthesizes information from across the government and presents it to the president. Trump recently bragged that a lot of people wanted the job.
"It's great because it's a lot of fun to work with Donald Trump," he told reporters last week. "And it's very easy, actually, to work with me. You know why it's easy? Because I make all the decisions. They don't have to work."
Jerry Green, who leads the Pacific Council on International Policy in Los Angeles, praised O'Brien, saying he "works and plays incredibly well with others." He said O'Brien had formed strong relationships with Pompeo and members of Congress.
"He is really an ethical guy," Green said. "A good guy. He's been doing this a long time."
On Tuesday, Trump had told reporters on Air Force One that he was still considering five candidates for national security adviser, including O'Brien. Hours later, White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said Trump had more than five people on his list and others were being considered.
But Trump was clearly impressed with O'Brien, and flattered by him.
"Robert O'Brien said, 'Trump is the greatest hostage negotiator in history,'" Trump said Tuesday. "He happens to be right."
One administration official said the president has told aides that the tall, silver-haired O'Brien "looks the part," a common refrain from a former reality television star who is fixated on how his White House is portrayed in the media.
O'Brien, a longtime resident of La Canada Flintridge, Calif., received his bachelor's degree at the University of California, Los Angeles and then his law degree at UC Berkeley. But he has a thinner national security resume than that of his predecessors in the Trump administration.
The president's first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, was a retired three-star Army general who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and led the Pentagon's intelligence operations. He held the White House position for less than a month, however, and was later indicted in the Russia investigation. He pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing.
The second national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, was also a three-star Army general with a distinguished military career. Bolton had served in the State Department and as U.S. ambassador to the U.N. under President George W. Bush before becoming a Fox News commentator. He lasted longer than his predecessors in the White House but clashed with Trump over Iran and Afghanistan.
By contrast, O'Brien co-founded a Los Angeles-based law firm, Larson O'Brien, where he focused on "complex commercial litigation," according to the firm's website. His clients hail from the entertainment, real estate and oil and gas industries, among others.
O'Brien previously worked with Bolton at the U.N. and served as an adviser to several Republican presidential campaigns. He wasn't always in Trump's camp but, like many Republicans, fell in line after the 2016 campaign.
During the race, he wrote a Politico Magazine essay encouraging Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, Trump's chief rival for the nomination in the final months, to criticize Trump over "how chummy he will be with Vladimir Putin if elected," and began working for Cruz's campaign.
But after Trump prevailed over Hillary Clinton, O'Brien made a point of praising Trump in print. "Trump Just Keeps Winning: America's Allies Are Boosting Defense Spending," one essay was headlined.
When Trump took office in 2017, he chose O'Brien to lead hostage negotiations, where he worked in a vault in the State Department to protect classified information.
But it also allowed O'Brien to work on high-profile cases _ such as an American pastor incarcerated in Turkey _ that garnered the kind of attention on cable news that the president craves.
During Oval Office ceremonies with freed individuals, O'Brien always made a point of effusively praising the president.
When oil company engineer Danny Burch was released in Yemen, O'Brien credited Trump's "unparalleled success in bringing Americans home without paying concessions, without prisoner exchanges, but through force of will and the good will that he's generated around the world."
Trump also dispatched O'Brien to Sweden, where he was demanding the release of American rapper ASAP Rocky, who had been charged with assault. The decision raised eyebrows because the case involved a criminal proceeding, not a hostage situation. The rapper ultimately was convicted.
