Jameela Raja Akbari serves as a Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Global Talent Management (GTM) at the U.S. Department of State. In this role she supports the Offices of Performance Evaluation (PE), Policy, Planning and Coordination (PPC), and the Grievance Staff (G). She serves as the Department’s Deputy Chief Human Capital Officer. 

She has worked at the U.S. Department of State since 2014, first as a Senior Advisor for the Chief Information Officer before leading a new information technology workforce planning unit. From 2019 to 2023, she led OAA.

Jameela began her federal career in 2001 as a Presidential Management Fellow at the Department of Health and Human Services. She has also worked at the Social Security Administration, the U.S. Office of Management and Budget, and did a detail to the Department of Education’s Office of the Deputy Secretary and the Bureau of South and Central Asia in the Department.

Jameela holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of Chicago and a master’s degree from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education. A native of suburban Chicago, she and her spouse parent three children and she considers herself a motivated, yet mediocre runner.

Eliza joined the Department of State as a local hire in Jerusalem in 1997, working primarily in American Citizen Services. She entered the Foreign Service in 2000 in the Management cone. Her first tours were in Mumbai as Vice Consul and in Cairo as Assistant Cultural Affairs Officer.

Since 2005 Eliza has gained management expertise through overseas and domestic assignments, initially as Human Resources Officer in the Iraq Support Unit in Amman, Jordan. Subsequently she served as Post Management Officer in the East Asia and Pacific Bureau where she developed the China Mandarin Pilot Program to build the Department’s corps of mid-level Chinese speakers. After two years of studying Chinese herself, Eliza managed operations at the U.S. Consulate General in Shanghai and then at the American Institute in Taiwan. In Shanghai, she negotiated land acquisition with the Chinese and, together with the Consul General, won approval for the Department’s asymmetrical language incentive program. In Taiwan, she led preparations to move 500 employees into a new office compound and modernized management operations at the Department’s only overseas, non-profit institute.

In 2018, Eliza returned to Washington, serving in the joint Executive Office for the Bureaus of Near East Asian Affairs and South and Central Asian Affairs, first as Supervisory Post Management Officer where she coordinated a whole of government strategy in Iraq as well as the evacuation of three posts and then as Regional Programs Coordinator, conducting strategic planning for the overseas support platform that serves 30 diplomatic missions. As Consul General in Guadalajara, Mexico, Eliza and her team strengthened U.S. cooperation with local partners to fight trafficking in persons.

Eliza currently serves as Dean of the School for Language Studies at the Foreign Service Institute.

Eliza has a master’s degree in Environmental Management from Duke University and a B.A. in World Political Economy from Colorado College. She speaks Arabic, Chinese, French, and Spanish. In 1995, she was a Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellow in Arabic.

Michael Anton became the 33rd Director of the Secretary’s Policy Planning Staff on January 20, 2025.

Before returning to government, Anton was a Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute, where he taught in the Institute’s five fellowship programs, wrote for the Claremont Review of Books, and was researching a book on the state of California. Anton was concurrently a Lecturer in Politics at Hillsdale College, for which he designed and hosted the College’s online course “American Foreign Policy” and taught courses on national security, grand strategy, and political philosophy at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Anton has served a total of nine years in government, in the administrations of California Governor Pete Wilson, New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, President George W. Bush, and President Donald J. Trump. In President Trump’s first administration, Anton served as Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communication on the National Security Council Staff at the White House. He also served for four years on the NSC staff in the George W. Bush administration. Between those two administrations, Anton spent 12 years in the private sector in various roles in media and finance.

Anton is the author of three books and co-editor of one essay collection. He also has two books of his own previously published essays forthcoming. In addition, Anton has been widely published in the mainstream and academic presses, including in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, Interpretation, and Perspectives on Political Science. Anton’s numerous articles on foreign and national security policy include “America and the Liberal International Order” (American Affairs, 2017), “The Trump Doctrine” (Foreign Policy, 2019), and “The Containment of George Kennan” (Claremont Review of Books, 2023). He is perhaps best known as the author of “The Flight 93 Election,” the 2016 viral essay that galvanized many to support then-candidate Trump.

Sarah Arkin is the Executive Director of the Advisory Commission for Public Diplomacy.  For just over six years prior to starting at the Commission, Sarah served in various positions on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, including as Deputy Staff Director. There she was responsible for covering the State Department’s Public Diplomacy Undersecretariat and the U.S. Agency for Global Media including advising multiple Chairmen on public diplomacy; through developing and reviewing relevant legislation; general oversight; and shepherding nominations. She also handled multiple geographic regions. Prior to that, she worked as a policy advisor in the House of Representatives. Previously, Sarah was a civil servant in the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, covering a range of issues. Sarah worked as a research assistant at the Institute for National Strategic Studies at National Defense University and received a Boren National Security Education Program Fellowship in Egypt in 2012. Before her government career she worked as a journalist and photojournalist, winning a Virginia Press Association Breaking News Award in 2009. She has lived/studied/worked in Israel, Kenya, Spain, and Uganda. She has a B.A. from Tufts University and an M.A. from Georgetown University.

John Armstrong assumed the role of Senior Bureau Official in the Bureau of Consular Affairs on February 27, 2025, after briefly serving as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Overseas Citizens Services. He is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service.  Previously, he served as Consul General in Lima, Peru.  His other domestic service includes Director of the Office of Eastern European Affairs, Director of the Washington Passport Agency, Senior Political Officer on the Russia Desk, and Belarus Desk Officer.  Overseas, he served in Warsaw (Economic Counselor, Labor Officer, Trade Officer), Nassau (Consular Section Chief/acting Deputy Chief of Mission), Kyiv (Deputy Consul General), and Bucharest (Nonimmigrant Visa Chief).  He earned degrees in history at the University of Minnesota (BA) and University of Wisconsin-Madison (MA). He was a Fulbright Researcher in Poland.  With his wife of nearly four decades, he has three children and three grandchildren.  He speaks Polish, Romanian, Spanish, Ukrainian and some Russian.  He joined the Foreign Service in 1994.

Susan Astley-Cass is a member of the Senior Foreign Service, rank of Minister Counselor, currently serving as the Deputy Comptroller for Customer Engagement under the Bureau of the Comptroller and Global Financial Services (CGFS). The Deputy Comptroller for Customer Engagement oversees the CGFS Bureau’s support of overseas financial operations through its Bangkok Financial Service Center and its Post Support Unit operations in Charleston, Bangkok, Sofia, and Manila, as well as its Customer Support and Training operations in Charleston, FSTO Paris, and Bangkok.  The Deputy Comptroller for Customer Engagement also carries out the delegated authorities and responsibilities of the Comptroller regarding debt collections and the waiver of claims owed to the Department of State and spearheads CGFS “home bureau” advocacy of the FMO corps, career path development, retention, and engagement.  Previously, Susan served as a senior advisor in the Office of the Undersecretary for Management. Susan’s Foreign Service career spans over 25 years and includes postings across four regional bureaus and six overseas tours in Mexico, Canada, Afghanistan, China, and Nigeria. Her last assignment in CGFS was as a senior advisor to the Comptroller and as the Director of the Post Support Unit in the Bureau of the Comptroller & Global Financial Services, providing financial management support to posts around the world.  Ms. Astley-Cass holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting from American University, and a master’s degree in strategic studies from the U.S. Army War College.

Courtney E. Austrian is the Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary overseeing policy for Western Europe and the European Union in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs.  Immediately prior to assuming her duties, she served as Director of the Office of the European Union and Regional Affairs.   

A career member of the senior foreign service, Ms. Austrian previously served as Deputy Chief of Mission and long-time Chargé d’Affaires to the U.S. Mission to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.  Previous overseas assignments within the EUR Bureau include the United Kingdom, Georgia, Ukraine, and Russia. In Washington, Ms. Austrian’s assignments have included Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of International Information Programs and staff to the Secretary of State.   

Ms. Austrian received a B.A. from Swarthmore College, an MBA in Public and Non-Profit Administration from Boston University, and a M.S. in National Security Strategy from the National War College. 

Seth Bailey is a career senior foreign service officer who currently serves concurrently as the Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Australia, New Zealand, and Pacific Islands and the Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Japan, Korea, and Mongolia. Most recently, he was the Director of the Office of Korean and Mongolian Affairs. Previously, Seth served as Senior Diplomatic Fellow and visiting professor at the DoD-affiliated Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Honolulu, Hawaii, where he taught on the U.S. Indo-Pacific Strategy and the U.S.-China relationship.

Before that, he served as the Minister Counselor for Political Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, China from 2019-2022. He has also held overseas positions of leadership in Afghanistan, the Republic of Korea, and Sri Lanka. In Washington, Seth has served as the Senior Advisor for the Deputy Secretary and acting Deputy Director for the China Desk from 2015-2017. He has also served tours in the Bureau of Legislative Affairs, Bureau of Economic Affairs, and Bureau of Counterterrorism. Seth speaks Chinese and Korean. He’s received numerous meritorious and superior honor awards, as well as the Department’s 2022 James Clements Dunn Award for Excellence in Leadership.

Prior to joining the foreign service, Seth was a practicing attorney licensed in Utah, Idaho, and Washington. He has a juris doctorate from the University of Texas School of Law and a Bachelor of Arts from Brigham Young University.

Stephen Banks joined the Bureau of Energy Resources in summer 2024 as director for Europe, the Western Hemisphere, and Africa. He became Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Energy Diplomacy in January 2025. He is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service. Most recently he served as Political Minister-Counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, Turkey, and before that as Deputy Chief of Mission of the U.S. Embassy in Asmara, Eritrea.

He previously served as the political and economic counselor in Pristina, Kosovo, following his assignment as deputy director for South Central Europe in the Department of State. At the U.S. Mission to the United Nations in New York, he coordinated UN Security Council engagement on Sudan, South Sudan, and Somalia, as well as special committee (C-34) negotiations on UN peacekeeping policy. He served one year in Iraq, first as the Embedded Provincial Reconstruction Team (ePRT) Leader in Fallujah, Anbar Province, then as Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) Leader for Maysan Province. Previous U.S. Embassy assignments included Georgetown, Guyana; Sofia, Bulgaria; and Yerevan, Armenia. His other Washington assignments included the State Department’s 24-hour Operations Center and serving as country desk officer for Azerbaijan and Tajikistan.

Before joining the Foreign Service, he worked as a U.S. Department of Commerce international trade specialist and he served eight years in the U.S. Navy Reserve.

Darren Beattie joins the State Department from the private sector, where he worked as a media entrepreneur and political strategist. He has served in government previously as a White House speechwriter and policy aide, and by presidential appointment to the Commission for the Preservation of American Heritage Abroad. 

A former academic, Beattie has taught political theory at Duke University and Humboldt University in Berlin. He holds a B.S. in mathematics from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. in political theory from Duke University, where he wrote his dissertation on mathematics and the structure of modernity. 

As the State Department’s Senior Official in Public Diplomacy, Beattie is passionate about affirmatively advancing free speech as a diplomacy tool, and marshalling America’s exceptional cultural achievements in the arts, music, and academia in furtherance of the safety, strength, and prosperity of the American people.