Antony Blinken

Early life and education

Blinken was born on April 16, 1962, in Yonkers, New York, to Jewish parents. His mother was Judith (née Frehm) Blinken and his father was Donald M. Blinken, a co-founder of the private equity firm Warburg Pincus who later served as the U.S. ambassador to Hungary. His maternal grandparents were Hungarian Jews. Blinken's uncle, Alan Blinken, served as the U.S. ambassador to Belgium. His grandfather, Maurice Henry Blinken, was an early backer of Israel who studied its economic viability, and his great-grandfather was Meir Blinken, a Yiddish writer.

Blinken attended the Dalton School in New York City until 1971. He then moved to Paris with his mother and Samuel Pisar; his mother married Pisar after divorcing Donald Blinken. In his confirmation hearing, Blinken recalled the story of his stepfather, Pisar, who had been the only Holocaust survivor of the 900 children in his school in Poland. Pisar found refuge in a U.S. tank after making a break into the forest during a Nazi death march. In Paris, Blinken attended École Jeannine Manuel.

From 1980 to 1984, Blinken attended Harvard College, where he majored in social studies. He co-edited Harvard's daily student newspaper, The Harvard Crimson, and wrote a number of articles on current affairs. After graduating from the university, Blinken worked as an intern for The New Republic for about a year. He earned a J.D. from Columbia Law School in 1988 and practiced law in New York City and Paris. Blinken worked with his father to raise funds for Michael Dukakis, the Democratic nominee in the 1988 United States presidential election. He aspired for a time to be a journalist or a film producer.

In his monograph Ally versus Ally: America, Europe, and the Siberian Pipeline Crisis (1987), Blinken argued that exerting diplomatic pressure on the Soviet Union during the Siberian pipeline crisis was less significant for American interests than maintaining strong relations between the United States and Europe. Ally versus Ally was based on Blinken's undergraduate thesis in which he interviewed Henry Kissinger.

Early diplomatic career (1994–2001)

Blinken has held senior foreign policy positions in two administrations over two decades. He was a member of the United States National Security Council staff from 1994 to 2001. From 1994 to 1998, Blinken was special assistant to the president and senior director for strategic planning and National Security Council senior director for speechwriting. From 1999 to 2001, he was special assistant to the president and senior director for European and Canadian affairs.

Diplomatic career

Clinton and Bush administrations

In 2002, Blinken was appointed staff director for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a position he served in until 2008. Blinken assisted then-Senator Joe Biden, Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in formulating Biden's support for the U.S. invasion of Iraq, with Blinken characterizing the vote to invade Iraq as "a vote for tough diplomacy". Blinken supported the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

In the years following the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq, Blinken assisted Biden in formulating a proposal in the Senate to establish in Iraq three independent regions divided along ethnic or sectarian lines: a "Shiastan" in the south, a "Sunnistan" in the north, as well as Iraqi Kurdistan. The proposal was overwhelmingly rejected at home, as well as in Iraq, where the prime minister opposed the partition plan.

He was also a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. In 2008, Blinken worked for Joe Biden's presidential campaign, and was a member of the Obama–Biden presidential transition team.

Obama administration

From 2009 to 2013, Blinken was deputy assistant to the president and National Security Advisor to the Vice President. In this position he helped craft U.S. policy on Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the nuclear program of Iran. Blinken was sworn in as deputy national security advisor, succeeding Denis McDonough, on January 20, 2013.

On November 7, 2014, President Obama announced that he would nominate Blinken for the deputy secretary post, replacing the retiring William J. Burns. On December 16, 2014, Blinken was confirmed as Deputy Secretary of State by the Senate by a vote of 55 to 38.

Of Obama's 2011 decision to kill Osama bin Laden, Blinken said "I've never seen a more courageous decision made by a leader." A 2013 profile described him as "one of the government's key players in drafting Syria policy", for which he served as a public face. Blinken was influential in formulating the Obama administration's response to the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation in the aftermath of the 2014 Ukrainian revolution.

Blinken supported the 2011 military intervention in Libya and the supply of weapons to Syrian rebels. He condemned the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt and expressed support for the democratically elected Turkish government and its institutions, but also criticized the 2016–present purges in Turkey. In April 2015, Blinken voiced support for the Saudi Arabian–led intervention in Yemen. He said that "as part of that effort, we have expedited weapons deliveries, we have increased our intelligence sharing, and we have established a joint coordination planning cell in the Saudi operation centre."

Blinken worked with Biden on requests for American money to replenish Israel's arsenal of Iron Dome interceptor missiles during the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict. In May 2015, Blinken criticized the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and warned Myanmar's leaders about the dangers of anti-Muslim legislation, saying that Rohingya Muslims "should have a path to citizenship. The uncertainty that comes from not having any status is one of the things that may drive people to leave."

In June 2015, Blinken claimed that more than ten thousand ISIL fighters had been killed by American-led airstrikes against the Islamic State since a U.S.-led coalition launched a campaign against it nine months previously.

U.S. Secretary of State (2021–2025)

Nomination and confirmation

Blinken was a foreign policy advisor for Biden's 2020 presidential campaign. On November 22, 2020, Bloomberg News reported that Biden had selected Blinken as his nominee for secretary of state. These reports were later corroborated by The New York Times and other outlets. On November 24, upon being announced as Biden's choice for secretary of state, Blinken said, "We can't solve all the world's problems alone [and] we need to be working with other countries." He had earlier remarked in a September 2020 interview with the Associated Press that "democracy is in retreat around the world, and unfortunately it's also in retreat at home because of the president taking a two-by-four to its institutions, its values and its people every day."

Blinken's confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee began on January 19, 2021. His nomination was confirmed by the committee on January 25 with a vote of 15–3. On January 26, Blinken was confirmed in the full Senate by a vote of 78–22. Blinken took the oath of office of the secretary of state later that day. In doing so, he became the third former deputy secretary of state to serve as the Secretary of State, after Lawrence Eagleburger and Warren Christopher in 1992 and 1993, respectively.

Tenure

In February 2021, Blinken condemned ethnic cleansing in the Tigray region of northern Ethiopia and called for the immediate withdrawal of Eritrean forces and other fighters.

In the midst of the Biden administration's continuing review of the normalization agreement between Morocco and Israel enacted during the previous administration, Blinken maintained that the recognition of Morocco's sovereignty over the disputed territory of Western Sahara, which was annexed by Morocco in 1975, will not be reversed imminently. During internal discussions, he supported improving relations between the two countries and expressed urgency in appointing a United Nations envoy to Western Sahara.

In March 2023, Blinken met with Ethiopian prime minister Abiy Ahmed in Addis Ababa to normalize relations between the United States and Ethiopia that were strained by the Tigray War between the Ethiopian government and Tigray rebels.

In January 2025, Blinken declared that the combatants in the Sudanese civil war were carrying out a genocide.

Blinken made his first international trip with Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to Tokyo and Seoul on March 15, during which he warned China against coercion and aggression. He also condemned the Chinese government for committing genocide against ethnic Uyghurs.

In July 2021, the Biden administration accused China of a global cyberespionage campaign, which Blinken said posed "a major threat to our economic and national security".

In late April 2021, Blinken denounced the sentencing of Hong Kong pro-democracy activists Jimmy Lai, Albert Ho, and Lee Cheuk-yan among others, for their roles in the 2019 Hong Kong protests, calling it a "politically-motivated" decision.

In May 2022, Blinken stated that "China is the one country that has the intention as well as the economic, technological, military and diplomatic means to advance a different vision of international order." He dismissed China's claims to be neutral in the Russo-Ukrainian War and accused China of supporting Russia.

Post-Biden administration (2025–present)

On January 28, 2025, Crown Publishing Group announced that Blinken had agreed to write a book on his experiences as Secretary of State.

On February 8, 2025, President Trump stated that he would be stripping Blinken's security clearance in an interview with the New York Post. The decision was later confirmed, with Trump ordering the removal of Blinken’s access to classified information. Trump also announced plans to revoke the security clearances of several other officials, including former president Joe Biden, Letitia James, Alvin Bragg, and former national security adviser Jake Sullivan.

On April 9, 2025, Blinken was interviewed by Andrew Ross Sorkin about the Tariffs in the second Trump administration, as well as other foreign policy matters.

Foreign policy positions

As foreign policy advisor to then 2020 Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, The New York Times described Blinken as "ha[ving] Biden's ear on policy issues". The politically progressive magazine In These Times described his foreign policy positions in 2020 as "hawkish." Blinken has asserted that "[Biden] would not tie military assistance to Israel to things like annexation or other decisions by the Israeli government with which we might disagree". Blinken praised the Trump administration-brokered normalization agreements between Israel and Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates. On October 28, 2020, Blinken reaffirmed that a Biden administration will undertake strategic review of the relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia, ensuring that it advances U.S. interests and values. In January 2021, Blinken has stated the Biden administration would keep the American embassy to Israel in Jerusalem and would seek a two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.

Blinken is in favor of continuing non-nuclear sanctions against Iran and described it as "a strong hedge against Iranian misbehavior in other areas". He criticized former president Trump's withdrawal of the U.S. from the international nuclear agreement with Iran and expressed support for a "longer and stronger" nuclear deal. Blinken did not rule out a military intervention to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.

Blinken has been critical of the Trump administration in aiding China to advance its own key strategic goals. He stated: "[Trump] weaken[ed] American alliances, leaving a vacuum in the world for China to fill, abandoning our values and giving China a green light to trample on human rights and democracy from Xinjiang to Hong Kong". However, he also credited the former president's administration for its aggressive approach and has characterized China as a "techno-autocracy" which seeks world dominance. He indicated a desire to welcome political refugees from Hong Kong and stated that the Biden administration's commitment to Taiwan's defense would "absolutely endure", and that China's use of military force against Taiwan "would be a grievous mistake on their part". Blinken has also viewed China as committing genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghur Muslims and other ethnic minorities in its northwestern region of Xinjiang. Blinken has characterized former president Trump's Phase One trade deal with China as "a debacle". He said it was unrealistic to "fully decouple" from China and has expressed support for "stronger economic ties with Taiwan".

Other activities

Film producing

During the 1990s, Blinken was briefly involved in film producing. He was an associate producer on the 1995 film The Addiction, directed by Abel Ferrara.

WestExec Advisors

In 2017, Blinken co-founded WestExec Advisors, a political strategy advising firm, with Michèle Flournoy, Sergio Aguirre, and Nitin Chadda. WestExec's clients have included Google's Jigsaw, Israeli artificial-intelligence company Windward, surveillance drone manufacturer Shield AI, which signed a $7.2 million contract with the Air Force, and "Fortune 100 types". According to Foreign Policy, the firm's clientele includes "the defense industry, private equity firms, and hedge funds". Blinken received almost $1.2 million in compensation from WestExec.

In an interview with The Intercept, Flournoy described WestExec's role as facilitating relationships between Silicon Valley firms and the Department of Defense and law enforcement; Flournoy and others compared WestExec to Kissinger Associates.

Pine Island Capital Partners

Blinken, as well as other Biden transition team members Michele Flournoy, former Pentagon advisor, and Lloyd Austin, Secretary of Defense, are partners of private equity firm Pine Island Capital Partners, a strategic partner of WestExec. Pine Island's chairman is John Thain, the final chairman of Merrill Lynch before its sale to Bank of America. Blinken went on leave from Pine Island in August 2020 to join the Biden campaign as a senior foreign policy advisor. He said he would divest himself of his equity stake in Pine Island if confirmed for a position in the Biden administration.

During the final stretch of Biden's presidential campaign, Pine Island raised $218 million for a special-purpose acquisition company, a public offering to invest in "defense, government service and aerospace industries" and COVID-19 relief, which the firm's prospectus (initially filed with the U.S. SEC in September and finalized on November 13, 2020) predicted would be profitable as the government looked to private contractors to address the pandemic. Thain said he chose the other partners because of their "access, network and expertise".

In a December 2020 New York Times article raising questions about potential conflicts of interest between WestExec principals, Pine Island advisors, including Blinken, and service in the Biden administration, critics called for full disclosure of all WestExec/Pine Island financial relationships, divestiture of ownership stakes in companies bidding on government contracts or enjoying existing contracts, and assurances that Blinken and others recuse themselves from decisions that might advantage their previous clients.

Blinken is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and was previously a global affairs analyst for CNN.

Penn Biden Center

From 2017 to 2019, Blinken served as the managing director of the Penn Biden Center, a University of Pennsylvania think tank based in Washington. During this time he published several articles on foreign policy and the Trump administration.

Public image

In general, Blinken is widely seen as a close protégé of Joe Biden and a key part of the Biden administration’s legacy. He has received praise for his role in attempting to strengthen the United States’ international partnerships, particularly with Europe and NATO allies.

Blinken has faced criticism for elements of foreign policy enacted during the Biden presidency, particularly the Afghanistan withdrawal, the lead-up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and Israel’s assault on Gaza in response to the October 7 attacks. Critics and detractors of Blinken have pointed to the Biden administration’s support for Israeli policy in Gaza as a violation of human rights, given that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is the subject of an International Criminal Court warrant and the International Court of Justice is investigating his government for "plausible genocide." Blinken considered working with Congress to sanction the ICC in response to these arrest warrants.

Some State Department employees resigned in protest during Blinken’s tenure, citing the emotional burden of working under him. One official stated: “I got so tired of writing about dead kids.... Just constantly having to prove to Washington that these children actually died and then watching nothing happen.”

Activists have referred to him as “Bloody Blinken,” “The Butcher of Gaza,” and “The Secretary of Genocide,” and took the step of setting up a permanent protest camp outside his Northern Virginia home.

When asked directly in January 2025 if he worried that he had presided over what the world would see as a genocide, Blinken responded: “No. It’s not, first of all. Second, as to how the world sees it, I can’t fully answer to that. But everyone has to look at the facts and draw their own conclusions from those facts.” Subsequently, the International Association of Genocide Scholars and a UN commission both resolved that the assault on Gaza did indeed meet the legal definition of genocide.

In public opinion polling, 26% of respondents reported a favorable or very favorable opinion of Blinken, 31% had a somewhat or very unfavorable opinion, and 44% had no opinion at all in a poll conducted in December 2023.

Personal life

Blinken is Jewish. In 2002, Blinken and Evan Ryan were married in an interfaith ceremony officiated by a rabbi and a priest at Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Washington, D.C. They have two children. Blinken is fluent in French, and left-handed.

Blinken plays the guitar and has three songs available on Spotify by the alias Ablinken (pronounced "Abe Lincoln"). Blinken performed "Hoochie Coochie Man" by Muddy Waters in September 2023 to launch the Global Music Diplomacy Initiative at the State Department, the video of which went viral. In May 2024, he played rhythm guitar on the Neil Young song, "Rockin' in the Free World", in a bar in Kyiv, Ukraine during the first visit by a Biden administration official since the approval of U.S. supplemental funding for Ukraine's struggle against Russia.

Honors and awards

Awards and recognitions

Columbia Law School's Medal for Excellence (2016)

Wash100 Award (2021)

Publications

Articles

Blinken, Antony (October 1, 2024). "America's Strategy of Renewal". Foreign Affairs.

Blinken, Antony J. (December 2003). "From Preemption to Engagement". Survival. 45 (4): 33–60. doi:10.1080/00396330312331343576. ISSN 0039-6338. S2CID 154077314.

Blinken, Antony J. (June 2002). "Winning the War of Ideas". The Washington Quarterly. 25 (2): 101–114. doi:10.1162/01636600252820162. ISSN 0163-660X. S2CID 154183240.

Blinken, Antony J. (2001). "The False Crisis Over the Atlantic". Foreign Affairs. 80 (3): 35–48. doi:10.2307/20050149. JSTOR 20050149.

Blinken, Antony J. (1987). Ally versus Ally: America, Europe, and the Siberian Pipeline Crisis. New York: Praeger. ISBN 0-275-92410-6. OCLC 14359172.