GOP Fund-Raiser, Veteran Diplomat Chosen as Envoys
President Reagan announced today that he is nominating Joe M. Rodgers, a Tennessee millionaire and active fund-raiser for the Republican Party, to be the next U.S. ambassador to France and career diplomat Thomas Michael Toliver Niles to be ambassador to Canada.
Rodgers, 51, heads a Nashville construction firm and is credited with having raised more than $100 million for the GOP while serving as finance director of the Republican National Committee from 1978 to 1981. His nomination to the post in Paris, where he would succeed Evan Galbraith, had been expected for some time.
Niles, 46, has been serving as deputy assistant secretary for European and Canadian affairs. He entered the State Department in 1962 and has served in the embassies at Moscow and Belgrade. He would succeed Paul Heron Robinson Jr.
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