Twenty years after TV producer Mark Burnett gave Donald Trump a job on The Apprentice, Trump is giving Burnett a job in his administration.
On Saturday, December 21, Trump introduced in a Fact Social put up that he’s appointing Burnett as his Particular Envoy to the UK.
“With a distinguished profession in tv manufacturing and enterprise, Mark brings a singular mix of diplomatic acumen and worldwide recognition to this necessary function,” the president-elect wrote. “Mark is understood for creating and producing a few of the largest reveals in tv historical past, together with Survivor, Shark Tank, The Voice, and, most notably, The Apprentice. He’s the previous chairman of MGM and has gained 13 Emmy Awards!”
(Burnett was truly chairman of MGM’s Worldwide Tv Group, not all of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, per The Hollywood Reporter.)
In his envoy place, Burnett will “work to boost diplomatic relations, specializing in areas of mutual curiosity, together with commerce, funding alternatives, and cultural exchanges,” Trump added.
U.S. presidents sometimes decide envoys for geopolitical hotspots, not for one of many United States’ strongest allies, in line with the Related Press. Moreover, it’s not clear how Burnett’s put up will overlap with the extra customary function of U.S. ambassador to the UK, for which Trump has tapped billionaire funding banker Warren Stephens.
Burnett’s relationship with Trump goes again greater than twenty years. The New York Instances reported lately that it was Burnett and different producers of The Apprentice who offered TV viewers on the concept Trump was a billionaire businessman in 2004, glossing over Trump’s bankrupt properties and failing companies.
“Our job was to make him look reliable, to make him appear to be there was one thing behind it, regardless that we just about all knew that there wasn’t — however that was our job,” producer Jonathon Braun instructed the newspaper.
Burnett has supplied each reward and criticism of The Apprentice’s lead star. In a 2010 interview with the BBC, he known as Trump “fearless” and “an enormous, sturdy robust man.”
“He’s a really, very down-to-earth regular man, and he’s a very, actually loyal good friend and, as I’ve seen him with many different folks, not the form of enemy you’ll need,” Burnett stated on the time, per BBC Information.
In 2016, following Trump’s Entry Hollywood scandal, Burnett launched a press release clarifying that he had by no means been a supporter of Trump’s presidential candidacy. “I’m not ‘pro-Trump,’” he stated on the time, per The Hollywood Reporter. “Additional, my spouse [actor Roma Downey] and I reject the hatred, division, and misogyny that has been a really unlucky a part of his marketing campaign.”