United States Ambassador to the United Nations
Ambassador of the United States to the United Nations | |
---|---|
Seal of the United States Department of State | |
Nominator | Barack Obama |
Inaugural holder |
Edward Stettinius, Jr. as Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary |
Formation | December 21, 1945 |
Website | U.S. Mission – UN |
The United States Ambassador to the United Nations is the leader of the U.S. delegation, the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. The position is more formally known as the "Permanent Representative of the United States of America to the United Nations, with the rank and status of Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, and Representative of the United States of America in the Security Council of the United Nations"; it is also known as the U.S. Permanent Representative, or "Perm Rep", to the United Nations.
The U.S. Permanent Representative, currently Samantha Power, is charged with representing the United States on the U.N. Security Council and during almost all plenary meetings of the General Assembly, except in the rare situation in which a more senior officer of the United States (such as the U.S. Secretary of State or the President of the United States) is present. Like all United States ambassadors, he or she must be nominated by the U.S. President and confirmed by the Senate.
Many prominent U.S. politicians and diplomats have held the post, including Adlai Stevenson II, George H. W. Bush and Madeleine Albright.
Nikki Haley has been nominated for this position by President-elect Donald Trump and will start on January 20, 2017 pending confirmation by the Senate.[1]
Cabinet status
Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., a leading moderate Republican who lost his seat in the United States Senate to John F. Kennedy in the 1952 elections, was appointed ambassador to the United Nations in 1953 by Dwight D. Eisenhower in gratitude for the defeated senator's role in the new president's defeat of conservative leader Robert A. Taft for the 1952 Republican nomination and subsequent service as his campaign manager in the general election; Eisenhower raised the ambassadorship to cabinet rank in order to give Lodge direct access to him without having to go through the State Department.[2]
The ambassadorship continued to hold this status through the Ford, Carter, and Reagan administrations but was removed from cabinet rank by George H. W. Bush, who had previously held the position himself. It was restored under the Clinton administration. It was not a cabinet-level position under the George W. Bush administration (from 2001 to 2009),[3][4] but was once again elevated under the Obama administration. Former UN Ambassador John R. Bolton has publicly opposed the granting of cabinet-level status to the office, stating "One, it overstates the role and importance the U.N. should have in U.S. foreign policy, second, you shouldn't have two secretaries in the same department".
List of Ambassadors
The following is a chronological list of those who have held the office:
# | Image | US Ambassador to UN | Years served | U.N. Secretary-General | U.S. President |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Edward Stettinius, Jr. | 1945–1946 | Gladwyn Jebb (acting) | Harry S. Truman | |
Trygve Lie | |||||
— | Herschel V. Johnson (acting) |
1946–1947 | |||
2 | Warren Austin | January 14, 1947-January 22, 1953 | |||
Dag Hammarskjöld | |||||
3 | Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. | January 12, 1953 – September 2, 1960 | Dwight D. Eisenhower | ||
4 | James Jeremiah Wadsworth | September 8, 1960 – January 21, 1961 | |||
5 | Adlai Stevenson | January, 1961 — July 14, 1965 | John F. Kennedy | ||
U Thant | |||||
Lyndon B. Johnson | |||||
6 | Arthur Goldberg | 1965–1968 | |||
7 | George W. Ball | June 26, 1968 – September 25, 1968 | |||
8 | James Russell Wiggins | October 7, 1968 – January 20, 1969 | |||
9 | Charles Woodruff Yost | 1969–1971 | Richard Nixon | ||
10 | George H. W. Bush | March 1, 1971 – January 18, 1973 | |||
Kurt Waldheim | |||||
11 | John A. Scali | February 20, 1973 – June 29, 1975 | |||
Gerald Ford | |||||
12 | Daniel Patrick Moynihan | June 30, 1975 – February 2, 1976 | |||
13 | William Scranton | March 15, 1976 – January 19, 1977 | |||
14 | Andrew Young | January 30, 1977 – September 23, 1979 | Jimmy Carter | ||
15 | Donald McHenry | September 23, 1979 – January 20, 1981 | |||
16 | Jeane Kirkpatrick | February 4, 1981 – April 1, 1985 | Ronald Reagan | ||
Javier Pérez de Cuéllar | |||||
17 | Vernon A. Walters | 1985–1989 | |||
18 | Thomas R. Pickering | 1989–1992 | George H. W. Bush | ||
Boutros Boutros-Ghali | |||||
19 | Edward J. Perkins | May 12, 1992 – January 27, 1993 | |||
Bill Clinton | |||||
20 | Madeleine Albright | January 27, 1993 – January 21, 1997 | |||
Kofi Annan | |||||
21 | Bill Richardson | February 13, 1997 – August 18, 1998 | |||
— | Peter Burleigh (acting) |
August 18, 1998 – August 25, 1999 | |||
22 | Richard Holbrooke | August 25, 1999 – January 20, 2001 | |||
— | James B. Cunningham (acting) |
January 20, 2001 – September 15, 2001 | George W. Bush | ||
23 | John Negroponte | September 15, 2001 – July 1, 2004 | |||
24 | John Danforth | July 1, 2004 – January 20, 2005 | |||
— | Anne W. Patterson (acting) |
January 20 – August 1, 2005 | |||
25 | John R. Bolton Recess Appointment Never Confirmed by the U.S. Senate |
August 1, 2005 – December 9, 2006 | |||
— | Alejandro Daniel Wolff (acting) |
December 9, 2006 – April 17, 2007 | |||
Ban Ki-moon | |||||
26 | Zalmay Khalilzad | April 17, 2007 – January 22, 2009 | |||
27 | Susan Rice | January 22, 2009 – July 1, 2013 | Barack Obama | ||
— | Rosemary DiCarlo (acting) |
July 1 – August 1, 2013 | |||
28 | Samantha Power | August 2, 2013 – January 20, 2017 | |||
António Guterres (as of January 1, 2017) | |||||
29 | Nikki Haley (pending Senate confirmation) |
TBD (2017) | Donald Trump |
See also
Notes
- ↑ "Trump chooses women for Cabinet: Haley for UN, DeVos for Ed". The Big Story. Retrieved 2016-11-23.
- ↑ Hubbard, James P. (2011). The United States and the End of British Colonial Rule in Africa, 1941-1968. Jefferson City, NC: McFarland & Company. p. 172. ISBN 978-0-7864-5952-0.
- ↑ Kelemen, Michele (December 1, 2008). "U.N. Envoy Nominee Rice Known As Smart, Tough". National Public Radio. Retrieved January 21, 2009.
The head of the United Nations Foundation, a Washington-based advocacy group, released a statement praising Rice as well as Obama's decision to make the post of U.N. ambassador a Cabinet-level position once again—as it was during the Clinton years.
- ↑ Cooper, Helene (November 20, 2008). "Clinton Decision Holding Up Other Obama Choices". New York Times. Retrieved February 9, 2009.
Ms. Rice could get the post of United States ambassador to the United Nations, a cabinet-level position under President Clinton. President Bush downgraded the position when he came into office
External links
- United States Mission to the United Nations
- Bureau of Diplomatic Security (DS)
- U.S. Department of State's listing of U.S. ambassadors to the United Nations