Jon Finer

Jon Finer is a national security professional with experience in journalism, academia, and government service. Finer graduated from Harvard University, earned an M.Phil. in international relations at Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar, and received a J.D. from Yale Law School, where he co-founded the Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project. Before entering government, Finer worked as a foreign and national correspondent for The Washington Post, reporting from more than 20 countries. He spent 18 months covering the war in Iraq, first embedded with the U.S. Marines during the invasion and later based in Baghdad. He also covered conflicts in Gaza, Russia/Georgia, and Israel/Lebanon, as well as the U.S. presidential campaign.

Finer served as President Joseph R. Biden's Principal Deputy National Security Advisor, advising the president on foreign policy and leading national security decision-making and crisis management. He earned the National Security Medal, the highest White House honor for contributions to national security. His tenure included major foreign policy challenges such as the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the war in Ukraine.

Finer's experience includes roles as Chief of Staff and Director of Policy Planning at the U.S. Department of State, Senior Adviser to then-Principal Deputy National Security Adviser Antony Blinken, Special Adviser for the Middle East and North Africa, and foreign policy speechwriter for then-Vice President Biden. He joined the Obama administration as a White House Fellow assigned to the Office of the White House Chief of Staff and the National Security Council staff. In the private sector, Finer served as Global Head of Geo-Political Affairs at Warburg Pincus and as an Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Finer continues to contribute to U.S. foreign policy and national security as a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and a Non-Resident Fellow at Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy. He also serves as a Carnegie Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs and on the Council of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. Finer's career spans war correspondence, crisis management, and senior roles in American foreign policy and global affairs.