Reed Kessler

Reed Kessler is the Associate Director of Policy at the Ronald Reagan Institute in Washington, DC where she supports the Institute's national security portfolio. During her time at the Reagan Institute, her research and analysis has been published at Breaking Defense and War on the Rocks. Before joining RRI, she served in the U.S. Foreign Policy Program at the Council on Foreign Relations, where she assisted Ambassador Robert Blackwill with his new book on U.S. grand strategy, "The Lost Decade: The U.S. Pivot to Asia and the Rise of Chinese Power." Reed also brings experience from the Department of State at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations and the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations, as well as the UN Operations and Crisis Centre and the UN Refugee Agency.

Reed is a graduate of Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, where she received her Master’s in International Security Policy, Conflict Resolution, and Russia and the Post-Soviet States. She also graduated cum laude with a B.A. in Human Rights and Middle Eastern Studies from Columbia. She is a current fellow in the International Strategy Forum and the Aspen Strategy Group's Rising Leaders program and holds an Olympic World Record from the 2012 London Olympics.