Wednesday, April 6

Ambassador Eric Rubin, President of the American Foreign Service Association (AFSA) since 2019, spoke to us about “Challenges to American Diplomacy”-and there are many these days!

His Washington State Department assignments include: Regional and Security Affairs Officer for Central and Eastern Europe (1991-1993); Assistant White House Press Secretary for Foreign Affairs and NSC Director for Public Affairs (1997); Director of the Office of Policy Planning and Coordination of the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (2004-2006); Executive Assistant to the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs (2006-2008) and Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs (2008-2011)

His overseas assignments with the State Department have included working as the political and human rights officer in Honduras (1986-1988); Deputy Political Counselor in Kyiv, Ukraine (1994-1996); Consul General in Chiang Mai, Thailand (2001-2004); Deputy Chief of Mission in Moscow (2008-2011) and US Ambassador to Bulgaria (2016-2019).

Mr. Rubin holds a B.A. in history from Yale University (he is a classmate of Ernie Tucker). He was Dean and Virginia Rusk Fellow and a resident associate at Georgetown University’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy from 1999-2000. Eric speaks Thai, Spanish, French, Bulgarian, Ukrainian, and Russian.

Ambassador Rubin is married with two children.
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