But she turned it down, moving to Pennsylvania to teach at Bucknell University after she started work on her dissertation. He encouraged her to take the Foreign Service exam, which she passed in 1980. There, she also met an American diplomat named Lafayette Greenfield. being an American and being an African." "So for me, going to Africa for the first time, I connected the dot in a sense between the U.S.
It's not like you're an immigrant and you have relatives that you stay in touch with," she told the podcast " Global Dispatches" in 2017. "You live in the United States as an African American, and we know that we are of African descent, but there was no connection to Africa. and traveled to Liberia for fieldwork, where her interest in a diplomatic career was first sparked. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, assistant secretary of state for African Affairs, speaks during a Bloomberg West Television interview in San Francisco, May 31, 2016.Īfter getting her masters of public administration on a scholarship at the University of Wisconsin, Thomas-Greenfield started working on a Ph.D. She worked closely with Tony Blinken, then-Deputy secretary of state and now Biden's pick to be secretary, as well as John Kerry, the former top diplomat who will serve as Biden's special envoy for climate. Key to her new role, she also served as assistant secretary for African affairs, the top U.S. Bush and director general of the Foreign Service by President Barack Obama, overseeing recruitment, training, promotions, diversity and more. ambassador to Liberia by President George W. While Nikki Haley was a member of President Donald Trump's Cabinet while serving in the same role, his second envoy Kelly Craft was not, just like envoys under both Bush administrations.Ī career Foreign Service officer, she was tapped to serve as U.S. That is likely to change now that Biden has tapped her to join his Cabinet, once again elevating the role of U.N. Secretary of State John Kerry fists bumps with Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Linda Thomas-Greenfield as she continues he travels on the Continent while he prepares to depart from the airport in Lagos, Nigeria, Jan.
0 kommentar(er)
