US Senate confirms John Kerry as next secretary of state to replace Clinton

The US Senate on Tuesday confirmed Senator John Kerry will be the next secretary of state, approving President Barack Obama’s pick to replace Hillary Rodham Clinton as America’s top diplomat.

Kerry – a senator from Massachusetts best known outside the United States for his unsuccessful 2004 presidential campaign – was nominated last month to take over the foreign affairs portfolio in Obama’s second term team.

The Senate voted 94-3 in favour of the veteran Democratic lawmaker after the chamber’s Foreign Relations Committee, which Kerry chairs, approved the nomination earlier in the day.

His nomination was pushed through the Senate in a matter of days, given the clear bipartisan support for the 69-year-old veteran Democratic lawmaker, who spent 28 years in the Senate and has allies on both sides of the aisle.

He is known to have long coveted the job, but almost lost out to US ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, seen as Obama’s first choice.

Rice withdrew from consideration for the post under Republican fire over the administration’s confused public response to the September 11 attack on a US mission in Libya that left four Americans dead.