Joe Biden's pick for Libya ambassador withdraws her nomination

Jennifer Gavito had been subjected to lengthy delays as Senate panel bickered over unrelated ICC allegations of Israeli war crimes

Libyan flags at half mast in Tripoli on September 11, a year after Storm Daniel burst two dams and caused flooding that killed thousands in Derna. AFP

The US diplomat slated to become the country's next ambassador to Libya has withdrawn from consideration after a bickering Senate committee failed to advance her nomination for months.

Jennifer Gavito was nominated by President Joe Biden in January but Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee have stalled discussing the appointments of 26 career diplomats over a dispute with committee Democrats about an unrelated bill on the International Criminal Court, which has accused Israel and Hamas of war crimes in Gaza.

“Last week, I asked that President Biden withdraw my nomination as US Ambassador to Libya,” Ms Gavito wrote on LinkedIn. “US national security deserves better than this. There has been no US ambassador in Libya for two years, ceding space to Russia and China who have actively sought to exploit our perceived absence and destabilise Nato's southern flank.”

She said she was first approached about the job more than two-and-a-half years ago and the uncertainty of not knowing her next steps had taken a toll on her family life.

The US, which has not had an ambassador in Libya since 2022, has a fraught diplomatic history with the North African nation. In 2012, four Americans including ambassador Christopher Stevens were killed when members of the militant group Ansar Al Sharia stormed a US consular compound in Benghazi.

The Biden administration notified Congress in April of its intention to resume embassy operations in Tripoli after a decade-long absence.

The US withdrew embassy staff in July 2014 in a dramatic overland escape, as civil war raged throughout Libya. Since then, the US has operated a diplomatic mission out of neighbouring Tunisia, with staff members making occasional short sorties to Tripoli.

Jennifer Gavito. Photo: LinkedIn