David J. Kramer (born 1964) was United States Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor from 2008 to 2009. He was President of

Freedom House Freedom House is a non-profit, majority U.S. government funded organization in Washington, D.C., that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, political freedom, and human rights. Freedom House was founded in October 1941, and Wendell Wil ...

from October 2010 to November 2014, and later worked at the McCain Institute. Following a professorship at the Florida International University, he became executive director of the

George W. Bush Institute The George W. Bush Presidential Center, which opened on April 25, 2013, is a complex that includes former United States President George W. Bush's Presidential library system, presidential library and museum, the George W. Bush Policy Institute, ...

Early life and education

David J. Kramer was born in Malden, Massachusetts, in December 1964 to Jewish parents. He grew up in Middleborough, Massachusetts, where he studied Russian in high school. He was educated at Tufts University, receiving his B.A. in Soviet Studies and Political Science in 1986. His advisor there was Sally Terry. Kramer then went on to get his M.A. in Soviet Studies in 1988 at Harvard University. In 1983 Kramer and his parents traveled to the Soviet Union to meet a relative who was still living in

Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

. He continued to make trips back to Latvia to visit family starting in 1992.

Career prior to government service

After university, Kramer was a

Lecturer Lecturer is an List of academic ranks, academic rank within many universities, though the meaning of the term varies somewhat from country to country. It generally denotes an academic expert who is hired to teach on a full- or part-time basis. T ...

in Russian Studies at Clark University, a Teaching Fellow for

Adam Ulam Adam Bruno Ulam (8 April 1922 – 28 March 2000) was a Polish-American historian of Jewish descent and political scientist at Harvard University. Ulam was one of the world's foremost authorities and top experts in Sovietology and Kremlinology ...

at Harvard University, and a consultant for Arthur D. Little in Cambridge, Massachusetts. During the collapse of the Soviet Union, he was an analyst for '' The Christian Science Monitor'' Network. In 1990 Kramer, his brother Mark Kramer, Nicholas Daniloff, Natalie Rumer, and other associates from the Russian Research Center at Harvard opened a consulting business called the Cambridge East-West Consulting Group Inc. The business did not last long, however. Kramer moved to Washington, D.C., and began working at the Center for Strategic and International Studies for

Stephen Sestanovich Stephen Rockwell Sestanovich (born June 8, 1950) is an American government official, academic, and author. He is the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Professor at the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University where he is the D ...

in 1993, on Ulam's recommendation. He followed Sestanovich to the

Carnegie Endowment for International Peace The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (CEIP) is a nonpartisan international affairs think tank headquartered in Washington D.C. with operations in Europe, South and East Asia, and the Middle East as well as the United States. Founded in ...

, becoming Associate Director of the Russian and Eurasian Program there, and setting up the Carnegie Moscow Center. Kramer then worked briefly as a Senior Fellow at the Project for the New American Century.

Government service

Kramer began his government service in April 2000, when he joined the United States Department of State as Executive Director of the United States Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy. Beginning in June 2001, he served as Special Advisor to the Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky. Then, in October 2003, Kramer became a professional staff member for the Policy Planning Staff. From July 2005 to March 2008, he was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs under

Dan Fried Daniel Fried (born 1952) is an American diplomat, who served as assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs from 2005 to 2009 and United States ambassador to Poland from 1997 to 2000.Belarus, Moldova, Russia, Ukraine, and

nonproliferation Nuclear proliferation is the spread of nuclear weapons, fissionable material, and weapons-applicable nuclear technology and information to nations not recognized as " Nuclear Weapon States" by the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Wea ...

. In 2008, President of the United States George W. Bush nominated Kramer as Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, and, after Senate confirmation, he held this office from March 21, 2008, to January 20, 2009. While there he led the resumption of the human rights dialogue with the Chinese, traveling to Beijing in May 2008. He spent much of his time at this post traveling to places like Hanoi, Vietnam, twice to Ethiopia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia, among others.

Post-government career

Kramer left his position at the State Department during the presidential transition of Barack Obama in January 2009, and became a Senior Transatlantic Fellow at the German Marshall Fund. He went on to become executive director of

on October 4, 2010. In February 2013, Kramer caused controversy at the bicentennial North American Invitational Model United Nations, when Kramer's opening keynote speech, which was rife with incrimination of the Chinese citizenry for obsequiousness towards the Chinese government and Communist Party, incited a walkout of 300 Chinese visitors, prompting Kramer to cut the much-advertised speech short. Kramer has since pushed back on the backlash, suggesting that the Chinese students who were invited to the event are close to the Chinese political elite, and that their walkout only reinforced the point of his remarks. Later, Kramer suggested that students close to authoritarian power groups should not have been invited to an event focused on the promotion of peace and diplomacy. On June 18, 2014 Freedom House announced that Kramer planned to resign that fall. On October 1, 2014 Freedom House announced that

Mark P. Lagon Mark P. Lagon (born 1965) is an American political scientist and practitioner. His areas of expertise include human rights, global health, human trafficking, and global institutions and governance. Lagon is the Chief Policy Officer at Friends of ...

would replace him in 2015. In November 2014, Kramer became the Senior Director for Human Rights and Human Freedom at the McCain Institute. In 2016 Kramer argued that the Minsk II peace agreement should be scrapped and western sanctions on Russia maintained. In his book, ''Back to Containment'', published in 2017, Kramer excoriated various elder statesmen of the United States, such as Henry Kissinger, for undertaking hybrid back-channel efforts to re-approach Russia, accusing them of naivete and violation of the Logan Act. Kramer contends that these actions undermined American security vis-a-vis Russia and the region, citing Kissinger's inclusion into

Myrotvorets Myrotvorets or Mirotvorets ( uk, Миротворець, lit=Peacemaker ), is a Ukrainian Kyiv-based website that publishes a running list, and sometimes personal information, of people who are considered by authors of the website to be "enemies ...

, Ukraine's semi-official blacklist. In 2018, he was on a list of Americans to be questioned by the Russian government. In two separate op-eds for '' Politico Magazine'' in 2016 and 2021, Kramer called for the most edgewise brinkmanship in tailoring new policy towards Russia, especially on the domestic side. While Kramer argued in his first op-ed that all employees of Russian propaganda outlets should be expelled from the United States, his second op-ed expanded this argument in favor of expulsion of "all Russian nationals even very tangentially, indirectly connected to the Russian oligarchy or the hostile Russian state".

Leaking Steele Dossier to BuzzFeed News

The Steele dossier, also known as the Trump–Russia dossier, is a controversial political opposition research report written from June to December 2016, containing many discredited allegations of misconduct, conspiracy, and cooperation between Donald Trump's presidential campaign and the

government of Russia The Government of Russia exercises executive power in the Russian Federation. The members of the government are the prime minister, the deputy prime ministers, and the federal ministers. It has its legal basis in the Constitution of the Russia ...

prior to and during the

2016 election The following elections occurred in the year 2016. Africa Benin Republic *2016 Beninese presidential election 6 March 2016 Cape Verde * 2016 Cape Verdean presidential election 2 October 2016 Chad * 2016 Chadian presidential election 10 A ...

campaign. In December 2016, Kramer leaked the Steele dossier to ''

Buzzfeed News ''BuzzFeed News'' is an American news website published by BuzzFeed. It has published a number of high-profile scoops, including the Steele dossier, for which it was heavily criticized, and the FinCEN Files. Since its establishment in 2011, it ...

''.Zaks, Dmitry.
“Russian tech exec sues Steele Dossier author in UK court”
Yahoo News and

Agence France-Presse Agence France-Presse (AFP) is a French international news agency headquartered in Paris, France. Founded in 1835 as Havas, it is the world's oldest news agency. AFP has regional headquarters in Nicosia, Montevideo, Hong Kong and Washington, D.C ...

(July 20, 2020).

Christopher Steele Christopher David Steele (born 24 June 1964) is a British former intelligence officer with the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) from 1987 until his retirement in 2009. He ran the Russia desk at MI6 headquarters in London between 2006 and 200 ...

had given a copy of the dossier for Kramer to show to Senator

John McCain John Sidney McCain III (August 29, 1936 – August 25, 2018) was an American politician and United States Navy officer who served as a United States senator from Arizona from 1987 until his death in 2018. He previously served two terms ...

. Steele has said that, when he learned of the leak by Kramer, he felt "deep dismay and disappointment... at learning that Mr. Kramer had seriously betrayed his trust".

Current positions

Kramer serves as a member of the board of directors of the Halifax International Security Forum and executive director of the

,“David J. Kramer”
George W. Bush Presidential Center (Retrieved 3 Nov 2022). as well as a member of the International Advisory Council at the Center for European Policy Analysis. In addition, Kramer is a member of the Ukraine Today media organization's International Supervisory Council.

References

External links

State Department Profile
*KFC
North American Invitational Model United Nations: NAIMUN 50
- February 18, 2013 *
January 2011 Interview
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kramer, David J. 1964 births Living people United States Assistant Secretaries of State Tufts University School of Arts and Sciences alumni Harvard University alumni Clark University faculty Harvard University faculty