OTTAWA – Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland is off to Washington to meet her counterpart Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and other leading Republicans.
Freeland will also be meeting Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan, Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee, the Republican chairman of the Senate foreign relations committee, and veteran Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona.
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Freeland was moved into Foreign Affairs last month in a cabinet shuffle by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau aimed at dealing with the election of Donald Trump as president.
She already engaged in a round of Washington networking in December when she was the trade minister.
Freeland’s trip is part of the Trudeau government’s ongoing full-court press on the Trump administration, which includes Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan’s visit Monday to the Pentagon and a Wednesday visit to Washington by Finance Minister Bill Morneau.
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Tillerson, the longtime chief executive officer of Exxon Mobil, was approved as Trump’s top diplomat last week.