USAID Afghanistan Leadership in Washington D.C.

Karen Freeman - Assistant to the Administrator

Jason Foley - Deputy Assistant to the Administrator

Kevin Brownawell - Acting Deputy Assistant to the Administrator

Chargé d’Affaires Ross Wilson

Term of Appointment: January 2020 to present

Ambassador Ross Wilson arrived in Kabul January 18, 2020, as the U.S. Chargé d’Affaires to the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.  Over the course of four decades as a U.S. diplomat, he has served as ambassador to Azerbaijan from 2000-2003 and to Turkey from 2005-2008, and he held later assignments as chargé d’affaires in Turkey in 2014 and the Republic of Georgia from 2018‑2019.

Elsewhere overseas, Ambassador Wilson served at the U.S. embassies in Moscow and Prague and was consul general in Melbourne, Australia.  He was principal deputy to the ambassador-at-large and special advisor to the U.S. Secretary of State for the new independent states of the former Soviet Union in 1997-2000.  He also served as deputy executive secretary of the U.S. State Department for Secretaries Jim Baker, Lawrence Eagleburger, and Warren Christopher; chief of staff to Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick; chief U.S. negotiator for the Free Trade Area of the Americas; and worked in State Department offices dealing with the USSR and Egypt.

From 2010 to 2014, Ambassador Wilson was director of the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center, where he led Council work on Turkey, the former Soviet states, and regional energy, economic, and political issues and integration, and organized its annual Energy and Economic Summits in Istanbul. In addition, he has been a visiting lecturer in international affairs at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C., and served on the boards of Global Minnesota and the Institute of Turkish Studies and on advisory councils of other non-profit organizations active in international affairs.

Ambassador Wilson received a bachelor’s degree from the University of Minnesota and master’s degrees from Columbia University and the U.S. National War College.  He is a recipient of the U.S. President’s Meritorious Service Award, as well as numerous U.S. Department of State awards and honors.  He holds memberships in the Academy of American Diplomacy; the American Foreign Service Association, Diplomatic and Consular Officers Retired; the Washington Institute of Foreign Affairs; and the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma.

Visit the website of the Embassy of the United States in Kabul, Afghanistan

USAID Mission Director Dr. Tina Dooley-Jones

Dr. Tina Dooley-Jones previously served as the USAID/Afghanistan Deputy Mission Director and before that as the Mission Director of the Kenya and East Africa Mission. She also served in Zimbabwe, South Africa, Namibia and Morocco. Dr. Dooley-Jones received a Ph.D. and Master’s degree in City and Regional Planning and a Master’s degree in Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania, and a Bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College.

USAID Deputy Mission Director Joel Sandefur

Joel Sandefur joined USAID in 2006. Before he started as Deputy Mission Director in March of 2020, he served as Senior USAID Resident Legal Officer (RLO) in Kabul.  He has previously served as RLO in Ukraine, Georgia, Afghanistan, South Africa, Iraq, and Ghana. Before USAID, Mr. Sandefur worked as an associate attorney for the firm of Jones Day in Los Angeles.  Prior to law school he worked in food aid logistics for the Adventist Development Relief Agency (ADRA) in Haiti. He received his B.A. in French from La Sierra University in Riverside, California and his J.D. from the University of Virginia.

USAID Deputy Mission Director Blake A. Chrystal

Blake A. Chrystal entered USAID’s Foreign Service in September of 2005. Prior to beginning as DMD in July of 2020, Mr. Chrystal served as the Director of the USAID/Afghanistan Office of Infrastructure.  In addition to Afghanistan, Mr. Chrystal has served overseas with USAID in Botswana, South Africa, and Moldova.  Before joining USAID, Mr. Chrystal worked for Catholic Relief Services in Albania and Macedonia, serving as Chief of Party on a number of different USAID funded projects.  He also served as a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer in Paraguay from 1996 to 1998.  Mr. Chrystal has a B.S. in political science from Arizona State University, an M.A. in international policy studies from the Monterey Institute of International Studies, and an M.S. in national resource strategy from the National Defense University.