1. Jacob Jeremiah Sullivan was born on November 28,1976 and is an American attorney who served as the US National Security Advisor from 2021 to 2025 under president Joe Biden.
52 Facts About Jake Sullivan
1. 2.
Jake Sullivan previously served as Director of Policy to President Barack Obama, National Security Advisor to then-Vice President Biden and Deputy Chief of Staff to Secretary Hillary Clinton at the US Department of State.
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Jake Sullivan served as senior advisor to the US federal government at the Iran nuclear negotiations and senior policy advisor to Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign, as well as visiting professor at Yale Law School.
4.
On November 23,2020, President-elect Biden announced that Jake Sullivan would be appointed the National Security Advisor.
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Jake Sullivan was born in Burlington, Vermont, to a family of Irish descent and grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
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Jake Sullivan's father worked for the Star Tribune and was a professor at the University of Minnesota School of Journalism and Mass Communication, and his mother was a high school guidance counselor.
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Jake Sullivan attended Southwest High School in Minneapolis, where he graduated in 1994.
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Jake Sullivan was a Coca-Cola Scholar, debate champion, president of the student council, and voted "most likely to succeed" in his class.
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Jake Sullivan won a Rhodes Scholarship to attend Magdalen College, Oxford, where he studied international relations.
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Jake Sullivan was awarded a Marshall Scholarship, which he declined in favor of the Rhodes.
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Jake Sullivan graduated with a Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in 2003.
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Jake Sullivan is a member, and former board member, of the Truman National Security Project.
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Jake Sullivan interned at the Council on Foreign Relations, was a member of the Yale Debate Association, and earned a Truman Scholarship in his junior year.
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Jake Sullivan worked for Brookings Institution president Strobe Talbott at the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization.
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In 2008, Jake Sullivan was an advisor to Hillary Clinton during the primary cycle and then to Barack Obama during the general election campaign.
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When Clinton became secretary of state, Jake Sullivan was named her deputy chief of staff and Director of Policy Planning, and traveled with her to 112 countries.
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In 2012, Jake Sullivan approvingly wrote that Al-Qaeda "was on our side in Syria" to Clinton.
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Clinton later joked that Jake Sullivan was a potential future president of the United States.
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Jake Sullivan worked in the Obama administration as deputy assistant to the president and National Security Advisor to Vice President Joe Biden.
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Jake Sullivan became Biden's top security aide in February 2013 after Clinton stepped down as secretary of state.
21.
On June 20,2014, The New York Times reported that Jake Sullivan was leaving the administration in August 2014 to teach at Yale Law School.
22.
Since then, Jake Sullivan has regularly attended bilateral consultations with Iran in Geneva as a member of the US delegation on the Iran nuclear negotiations.
23.
Jake Sullivan was Hillary Clinton's chief foreign policy adviser during her 2016 bid for the presidency.
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Jake Sullivan was reported to be the only senior staffer who repeatedly suggested that Clinton should spend more time in Midwestern swing states during the election campaign.
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On March 24,2022, former president Donald Trump sued numerous people including Clinton and Jake Sullivan alleging a conspiracy by the Clinton campaign to invent the Russian collusion scandal.
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Between 2017 and May 2020, Jake Sullivan served on an advisory council for Microsoft; in 2020, he was paid $45,000 for this work.
27.
On November 22,2020, Jake Sullivan was announced as Joe Biden's National Security Advisor.
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Jake Sullivan emphasized that the Biden administration aimed to repair American relations with allies that he regarded as being damaged during the Trump administration.
29.
On September 28,2021, Jake Sullivan met in Saudi Arabia with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to discuss the 2021 global energy crisis and Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen.
30.
On October 25,2021, Jake Sullivan was briefed by Pentagon officials on the full range of military options to ensure that Iran would not be able to produce a nuclear weapon.
31.
On November 7,2021, Jake Sullivan stated that the US does not pursue system change in China any longer, marking a clear break from the China policy pursued by previous US administrations.
32.
Jake Sullivan said that the US is not seeking a new Cold War with China, but is looking for a system of peaceful coexistence.
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On December 7,2021, Jake Sullivan warned that Russia's Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline project will end in the event of a Russian invasion of Ukraine.
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On January 14,2022, Jake Sullivan accused Russia of sending saboteurs into Ukraine to stage "a false-flag operation" that would create a pretext for Russia to invade Ukraine.
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Jake Sullivan warned of a high likelihood of escalation in the conflict as diplomatic were failing in United Nation's Security Council.
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Jake Sullivan suggested there is high likelihood of Russian invasion of Ukraine before the end of the 2022 Winter Olympics and there will be "no prospect of a US military evacuation" once an invasion commences.
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On March 13,2022, Jake Sullivan warned of a full-fledged NATO response if Russia attacks any part of NATO territory.
38.
Jake Sullivan reportedly advised Zelenskyy not to try to retake Crimea or attack the Crimean Bridge, fearing that Russia might respond with a nuclear strike.
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Jake Sullivan reportedly imposed restrictions to prevent Ukraine from using Western-supplied weapons for retaliatory attacks on Russian territory.
40.
On October 29,2023, Jake Sullivan dismissed calls for a ceasefire in Israel's war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, warning that any potential "humanitarian pause" to get hostages out of Gaza could benefit Hamas.
41.
Jake Sullivan declined to comment on whether Israel had committed war crimes in Gaza and whether Gazans would be allowed to return to their homes.
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Jake Sullivan informed Putin's foreign policy adviser Yuri Ushakov that the United States would not discuss a ceasefire without Ukraine's participation.
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Also in January 2024 Jake Sullivan met with Wang Yi at Bangkok for two days.
44.
In March 2024, Jake Sullivan warned Ukrainian officials to cease military strikes in Russia using Ukraine's own weaponry, amidst concerns about impacts on oil prices.
45.
On June 9,2024, Jake Sullivan said that the rescue operation to recover Israeli hostages from the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza was aided by intelligence support from the United States.
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Jake Sullivan had spoken to Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi along with Central Military Commission vice chairman General Zhang Youxia the previous day.
47.
Concerns were expressed over the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea, and Jake Sullivan made special reference to the November 2023 Woodside Summit.
48.
In January 2025, three days before leaving his position as National Security Advisor, Jake Sullivan warned that the next few years would be crucial in determining whether artificial intelligence leads to catastrophe and whether China or America prevails in the AI race.
49.
On January 14,2025, Jake Sullivan said that the shortage of personnel in the Armed Forces of Ukraine remains an acute problem, and recommended that Ukraine step up mobilization.
50.
Jake Sullivan will join the faculty of the Harvard Kennedy School on April 1,2025, as the inaugural Kissinger Professor of the Practice of Statecraft and World Order.
51.
Jake Sullivan is married to Maggie Goodlander, who has represented New Hampshire's 2nd congressional district in the US House of Representatives since 2025.
52.
Jake Sullivan discovered the man because he was still working at the time.