Ambassador Jim Jeffrey

Senior Advisor

Former Deputy National Security Advisor and Former Special Envoy to the Coalition to Defeat ISIS

Ambassador James F. Jeffrey retired from the Foreign Service with the rank of Career Ambassador in June 2012. His most recent positions at the State Department were as Special Representative for Syria and Special Envoy to the Coalition to Defeat ISIS. He retired from those positions in November 2020.

Previously, Jim held a series of senior posts in Washington, D.C., and abroad. Prior to his service as U.S. Ambassador to Turkey (2008-2010) and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq (2010-2012), he served as Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor in the George W, Bush Administration (2007-2008). Earlier assignments included serving as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the Department of State, Senior Advisor on Iraq to the Secretary of State, Chargé d’affaires and Deputy Chief of Mission in Baghdad, Ambassador to Albania, Deputy Chief of Mission in Ankara and Kuwait, and Deputy Coordinator for Bosnia.

Jim is currently the Chair of the Middle East Program at the Wilson Center. Between 2012 and 2018, he was the Philip Solondz Distinguished Visiting Fellow at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a Visiting Instructor at George Washington University, an energy consultant, and a member of the Secretary of Defense’s Defense Policy Board and the CIA Director’s External Advisory Board.

A former infantry officer in the U.S. Army, Jim served in Germany and Vietnam from 1969 to 1976. He and his wife Gudrun have two children, Julia, and Jahn.