Secretary of State Rex Tillerson called President Donald Trump a "moron" in July before nearly resigning after mounting policy disputes, according to multiple senior administration officials.
The tension between Tillerson and Trump peaked when the president politicized a speech he delivered to the Boy Scouts of America, an organization Tillerson once led from 2010 to 2012, according to NBC News:
Just days earlier, Tillerson had openly disparaged the president, referring to him as a "moron," after a July 20 meeting at the Pentagon with members of Trump’s national security team and Cabinet officials, according to three officials familiar with the incident.
While it's unclear if he was aware of the incident, Vice President Mike Pence counseled Tillerson, who is fourth in line to the presidency, on ways to ease tensions with Trump, and other top administration officials urged him to remain in the job at least until the end of the year, officials said.
Officials said that the administration, beset then by a series of high-level firings and resignations, would have struggled to manage the fallout from a Cabinet secretary of his stature departing within the first year of Trump’s presidency.
A White House official said Pence had spoken to Tillerson about being respectful of Trump in public meetings, and about how he should work out disagreements privately. The official said progress has been made, despite the disputes continuing over the weekend when Trump publicly chided Tillerson's role in negotiating with North Korea.
...Save your energy Rex, we'll do what has to be done!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 1, 2017
Tillerson was in Texas for his son's wedding in late July when Trump delivered a speech to the Boy Scouts of America, and the State Department chief at the time threatened not to return to Washington. Retired Gen. John Kelly, then head of Homeland Security who would soon be named Trump’s second chief of staff, and Defense Secretary James Mattis, are Tillerson's chief allies in Trump's cabinet. The two men coaxed the secretary of state to return to Washington, NBC reported:
After Tillerson’s return to Washington, Pence arranged a meeting with him, according to three officials. During the meeting, Pence gave Tillerson a "pep talk," one of these officials said, but also had a message: the secretary needed to figure out how to move forward within Trump’s policy framework.
Kelly and Mattis have been Tillerson’s strongest allies in the cabinet. In late July, "they did beg him to stay," a senior administration official said. "They just wanted stability."
At that time, however, State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert responded to speculation that Tillerson was thinking about resigning by saying he was "committed to staying" and was "just taking a little time off" in Texas.
The State Department and White House have been in continuous gridlock over the last several months, as top officials under the secretary of state have ignored White House directives on various policy matters, including critical staffing issues.
Multiple sources told the Washington Free Beacon the White House had sent multiple lists of potential candidates for job vacancies at that the State Department, but senior aides to Tillerson had ignored and trashed the lists, which they claim has elevated the roles of former Obama administration officials who still work in the department.
"Those lists [of candidates] literally go nowhere," according to one veteran Republican foreign policy operative familiar with the situation. "It's like a sham process. And the reason is not because the White House isn't behaving professionally. It's because Tillerson isn't professional at all."