Vanishing Clinton adviser reappears as Iran policy player
Washington— Last year, while Jake Sullivan was traveling with his boss, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, he quietly disappeared during a stop in Paris. He showed up again a few days later, rejoining Clinton’s traveling contingent in Mongolia.
In between, Sullivan secretly jetted to the Middle Eastern nation of Oman to meet with officials from Iran, people familiar with the trip said. The July 2012 meeting is one of the Obama administration’s earliest known face-to-face contacts with Iran and reveals that Sullivan was personally involved in the administration’s outreach to the Islamic republic far earlier than had been reported.
Senior administration officials had previously confirmed to the Associated Press that Sullivan and other officials held at least five secret meetings with Iran this year, paving the way for an interim nuclear agreement signed in November by Iran, the United States and five other world powers.
The cloak-and-dagger diplomacy may seem like a tough assignment even for a grizzled foreign policy veteran, but Sullivan is just 37 and looks even younger. Even-keeled and pragmatic, Sullivan’s temperament mirrors that of President Barack Obama, people close to him say. That helped him crack the tight-knit foreign policy team at the White House where he serves as Vice President Joe Biden’s national security adviser.
While Biden is a possible presidential candidate in 2016, Sullivan remains loyal to Clinton and is seen as her likely pick for White House national security adviser, should she run for president and win.
“He’s essentially a once-in-a-generation talent,” said Philippe Reines, a longtime Clinton aide who worked closely with Sullivan during their tenure at the State Department.
Sullivan has a gleaming resume: undergraduate and law degrees from Yale, Rhodes scholar at Oxford, and clerk for Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer. He entered politics by serving as chief counsel to Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Sullivan’s home state.
Sullivan wouldn’t comment on his outreach to Iran and declined to be interviewed for this story. But a speech he gave at the University of Minnesota last year provides some insight into how he views his quick rise in Washington and his view of public policy as a “study in imperfection.”
“Our government — any government, any organization — is the sum of the human beings who operate it, who bring with them all their faults, foibles, and frailties, and all of their creativity and cleverness,” he said.
In between, Sullivan secretly jetted to the Middle Eastern nation of Oman to meet with officials from Iran, people familiar with the trip said. The July 2012 meeting is one of the Obama administration’s earliest known face-to-face contacts with Iran and reveals that Sullivan was personally involved in the administration’s outreach to the Islamic republic far earlier than had been reported.
Senior administration officials had previously confirmed to the Associated Press that Sullivan and other officials held at least five secret meetings with Iran this year, paving the way for an interim nuclear agreement signed in November by Iran, the United States and five other world powers.
The cloak-and-dagger diplomacy may seem like a tough assignment even for a grizzled foreign policy veteran, but Sullivan is just 37 and looks even younger. Even-keeled and pragmatic, Sullivan’s temperament mirrors that of President Barack Obama, people close to him say. That helped him crack the tight-knit foreign policy team at the White House where he serves as Vice President Joe Biden’s national security adviser.
While Biden is a possible presidential candidate in 2016, Sullivan remains loyal to Clinton and is seen as her likely pick for White House national security adviser, should she run for president and win.
“He’s essentially a once-in-a-generation talent,” said Philippe Reines, a longtime Clinton aide who worked closely with Sullivan during their tenure at the State Department.
Sullivan has a gleaming resume: undergraduate and law degrees from Yale, Rhodes scholar at Oxford, and clerk for Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer. He entered politics by serving as chief counsel to Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Sullivan’s home state.
Sullivan wouldn’t comment on his outreach to Iran and declined to be interviewed for this story. But a speech he gave at the University of Minnesota last year provides some insight into how he views his quick rise in Washington and his view of public policy as a “study in imperfection.”
“Our government — any government, any organization — is the sum of the human beings who operate it, who bring with them all their faults, foibles, and frailties, and all of their creativity and cleverness,” he said.
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