Juliette Kayyem

Juliette served as President Obama's Assistant Secretary for Intergovernmental Affairs at the Department of Homeland Security. There she played a pivotal role in major operations including handling of the H1N1 pandemic and the BP Oil Spill response; she also organized major policy efforts in immigration reform and community resiliency. Before that, she served as Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick's homeland security advisor, guiding regional planning and the state's first interoperability plan, and overseeing the National Guard. She has also served as a member of the National Commission on Terrorism, a legal advisor to US Attorney General Janet Reno, and a trial attorney and counselor in the Civil Rights Division at the Justice Department. She is the recipient of many government honors, including the Distinguished Public Service Award, the Coast Guard's highest medal awarded to a civilian. In 2013, she was named the Pulitzer Prize finalist for editorial columns in the Boston Globe focused on ending the Pentagon's combat exclusion rule against women, a policy that was changed that year. Juliette is the Belfer Lecturer in International Security at Harvard Kennedy School, she teaches new leaders in emergency management and homeland security. She serves as a regular on-air national security analyst and contributor for CNN, hosts a national security podcast called The SCIF, and is a weekly featured analyst on Boston Public Radio, 89.7 WGBH Boston's Local NPR. A graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, mother of three children, she is married to First Circuit Court of Appeals Judge David Barron.