Prime Minister Bill English says he will welcome the appointment made by the United States' government for its next Ambassador to New Zealand.
The Boston Globe is tipping Scott Brown as the next US ambassador to New Zealand. Photo: AFP
Scott Brown has been tipped for the position, though no official announcement has been made.
Mr Brown is a former US senator, an early backer of Donald Trump, and a former model who won Cosmopolitan magazine's America's Sexiest Man contest in 1982, posing nude on the cover.
Mr English said there was a range of opinion on any appointment but it was the United States' decision who represented them.
"The main mission has been to get the relationship between the United States and New Zealand moving forward," he said.
The two countries' relationship was in "good shape" and New Zealand wanted an ambassador who understood that, Mr English said.
Mr Brown was described as a Republican from the left of the party.
He lost his senate seat to the high profile Democrat Elizabeth Warren, and was an early convert to Mr Trump's presidential campaign.
The Boston Globe reporter Jim O'Sullivan, who broke the story, told Morning Report the White House did not regard the Ambassador role in Wellington as a minor position.