David Wade

David Wade spent two decades at the highest levels of the State Department, on Capitol Hill, and as an adviser to two national presidential campaigns. Wade was the Chief of Staff to Secretary of State John F. Kerry and the Department of State for more than two years. Foreign Policy Magazine noted that at the State Department, Wade was “the driving force behind the Department’s day to day operations.”  Wade was awarded the Department’s highest honor — the Distinguished Honor Award — when he left government service in the summer of 2015 to found GreenLight Strategies.

For five years from 2008 through January, 2013, Wade served in the Senate as a Chief of Staff, overseeing and directing John Kerry’s operation as Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee as well as his broader political operation, including Kerry’s work on President Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign presidential debate prep. Wade is a veteran of two presidential campaigns, including serving as the traveling communications chief for the successful 2008 vice presidential campaign of Joe Biden.

Wade’s opinion and analysis columns have been published in The Atlantic, Foreign Policy, The Boston Globe,  Reuters, The Hill, Politico, and The Boston Herald .  He is a graduate of Brown University, a 1996 Harry Truman Scholar, 2011 John C. Stennis Fellow, serves on the Advisory Board to the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, served on the State Department’s Foreign Affairs Policy Board, and is a Fellow with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.