Trevor D. Traina (born 1968) is an American businessman who served as the

United States Ambassador to Austria This is a list of ambassadors of the United States to Austria. The United States first established diplomatic relations with Austria in 1838 during the time of the Austrian Empire. Relations between the United States have been continuous since t ...

from 2018 to 2021.

Early life

Traina was born in San Francisco, California in 1968. He is the son of Diane Buchanan Wilsey and the shipping magnate and art collector John Traina. His younger brother

Todd Todd or Todds may refer to: Places ;Australia: * Todd River, an ephemeral river ;United States: * Todd Valley, California, also known as Todd, an unincorporated community * Todd, Missouri, a ghost town * Todd, North Carolina, an unincorporated ...

is a film producer. His maternal grandfather, Wiley T. Buchanan Jr. was U.S. Ambassador to Austria from 1975 to 1977. Trevor Traina graduated from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

with an A.B. in politics in 1990, having written a 112-page long senior thesis titled "The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act: A Model for the Future?". He later studied at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

and at the UC Berkeley Haas School of Business where he graduated as

Master of Business Administration A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accoun ...

Career

Traina started his career as brand manager at

Seagram's The Seagram Company Ltd. (which traded as Seagram's) was a Canadian multinational conglomerate formerly headquartered in Montreal, Quebec. Originally a distiller of Canadian whisky based in Waterloo, Ontario, it was once (in the 1990s) the la ...

. As an entrepreneur, he was involved in the creation of ''CompareNet'', which was bought by Microsoft in 1999. In total he founded or co-founded five technology startups which were all sold. The most recent was IfOnly which was sold to MasterCard in August 2020 Traina was an honorary advisor to the

Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (FAMSF), comprising the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park and the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park, is the largest public arts institution in the city of San Francisco. The permanent collection of the ...

, the Haas School of Business, the

Princeton University Art Museum The Princeton University Art Museum (PUAM) is the Princeton University gallery of art, located in Princeton, New Jersey. With a collecting history that began in 1755, the museum was formally established in 1882, and now houses over 113,000 works o ...

and other institutions. He wrote columns for Huffington Post and for '' Town and Country'' magazine.

Ambassador to Austria

On January 23, 2018, President

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...

nominated Traina to become ''Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Republic of Austria''. The post had been vacant since January 2017. The U.S. Senate confirmed Traina's nomination on March 22, 2018. He was unanimously confirmed Traina was sworn in on March 29, 2018 and arrived in Vienna on May 18, 2018 to present his credentials. Traina subsequently presented his credentials on May 24, 2018. Traina risked controversy for supporting the LGBTQ community by flying a rainbow flag at the Embassy during

Vienna Pride Vienna Pride is a celebration that takes place in the Austrian capital every year in support of equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people. It includes the Austrian pride parade, the Rainbow Parade (Regenbogen-Parade) which t ...

despite a ban from the State Department on doing so. Traina is credited with arranging the most high level meetings between Austria and the US in history and bringing about an era of ''Verbundenheit'' or "new closeness" between the two countries that had not before been seen.

Awards

The Secretary of Defense awarded the Office of the Secretary of Defense Medal for Exceptional Public Service to Traina in January 2021. The Chancellor of Austria awarded Traina the Austrian Grand Declaration of Honor in Gold in January 2021. Traina has been awarded over two dozen patents from the USPTO Publications: American Photography. 2020 Walter Moser, Anna Heinrich, Trevor Traina

Personal life

Traina is married to Alexis Swanson Traina and has two children. His hobby is collecting photographs, an exhibition of his collection in summer 2012 at the Fine Arts Museum was discussed in the media. Traina made a major loan of photographs to the Albertina museum in Vienna for the Fall 2021 exhibition American Photography. In 2023 Traina paid to restore the Red Rooms in the Schloss Leopoldskron - home of the Salzburg Forum.

References

External links

Trevor D. Traina biography
at U.S. State Department {{DEFAULTSORT:Traina, Trevor Living people People from San Francisco Princeton University alumni Alumni of the University of Oxford Haas School of Business alumni American philanthropists 1968 births Ambassadors of the United States to Austria