Bush nominates a new ambassador to Australia

March 12, 2006

United States President George W. Bush has nominated Robert Davis McCallum, Jr. to be the new US Ambassador to Australia. The ambassadorship has been vacant for 12 months and 28 days.

McCallum is an associate attorney-general for the Department of Justice and previously represented big tobacco companies at an Atlanta law firm. He also has a master's degree from Oxford University and is a Rhodes Scholar as well as having a bachelor's degree from Yale.

Former deputy secretary of state, Richard Armitage, said earlier this month that the fact Australia was still without an ambassador might indicate a "lackadaisical attitude" to the region.

McCallum is one of the 15 Skull and Bones members from the 1968 group, of which President Bush was also a member.