Tony Blinken is described as someone who could have been raised for life as a diplomat. He grew up in New York and went to high school in Paris before returning to the U.S. and going to Harvard, then Columbia Law School. His father served as ambassador to Hungary during the Clinton years, and his stepfather is a Holocaust survivor (via The New York Times).
The State Department veteran is popular in Washington D.C. not just because he sings, plays the guitar, plays soccer, and loves the Beatles, but because he is a "pragmatic realist" that values the opinions of others, regardless of how junior or senior the person might be, and as a result, "It's never about him or his ego" (via Financial Times).
Author and CNN contributor David Andelman writes "... Blinken will bring perfect pitch. It will be left to him to carry out the bulk of Biden's principal early priorities — restoring American membership in the World Health Organization, the COP-21 Paris climate accord, the Iran nuclear agreement (JCPOA) and the Open Skies Agreement..." (via CNN).
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