Nausėda’s chief national security adviser Kęstutis Budrys has been nominated for the foreign minister by incoming Prime Minister Gintautas Paluckas.
On Friday, leader of the Liberal Movement Viktorija Čmilytė-Nielsen, deputy speaker of the Seimas, suggested a "cool-off period" for Budrys making the switch from the Office of the President to the Government. Several years ago, President Nausėda cited the same principle when refusing to appoint former ministers as ambassadors.
Nausėda said he saw the statements about the need for a cool-off unfounded in Budrys’ case.
"People either do not want to or do not see much difference (…). The term political cool-off is used when a person works for a political institution and moves to an institution that is strictly neutral, independent, not linked to any political forces," Nausėda told Žinių radijas on Tuesday.
The president recalled the appointment of former Conservative MP Stasys Šedbaras to the Constitutional Court in the previous Seimas.
"[Then] Seimas Speaker Viktorija Čmilytė-Nielsen was (…) at the centre of the events when a well-known former member of the Seimas, chair of the Committee on Legal Affairs, Mr Šedbaras, moved in one step from the Seimas to the Constitutional Court, which is subject to the strictest requirement of political neutrality," Nausėda said.
"It looks like a double standard, but once again, in this case we are talking about the reverse situation," he added.
During his first term of office, President Nausėda started discussions about the need of "political cool-off", i.e. a break before politicians switch from positions they hold to new duties of career civil servants. In 2021, Nausėda refused to appoint former ministers Linas Linkevičius and Raimundas Karoblis as ambassadors arguing that some more time should pass before the move and calling to "depoliticise the diplomatic service".
"We had situations in the past when the president was very clear and adamant that one or another politician or a ministerial candidate had ’to cool down’," Čmilytė-Nielsen said in an interview to Žinių Radijas on Friday.
"Yet again, the appointed prime minister forms the Government together with the president. The decision has been made, but perhaps it should be admitted more openly that this candidate is not the candidate of Gintautas Paluckas," she said, emphasising the importance of the separation of powers in a democratic country.