Careers, Life, and Yale Thursday Show: Yale Women in Service to Our Country

Witkowsky was sworn in as the U.S. assistant secretary for the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations (CSO) on January 10, 2022. She previously served in government as deputy assistant secretary of defense for Stability and Humanitarian Affairs from 2014-16 in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, U.S. Department of Defense (DoD). There, she held responsibility for policy on peacekeeping and stability operations, humanitarian assistance and disaster response, DoD support to the security of U.S. embassies, international humanitarian law, rule of law and protection of human rights, and women, peace, and security.

Prior, she served in the U.S. Department of State as the acting principal deputy coordinator (2012-13) in the Bureau of Counterterrorism (CT), and the CT deputy coordinator for Homeland Security and Multilateral Affairs (2009-13). From 1993 to 2000, she served as a director for defense policy and arms control on the White House National Security Council staff, with responsibility for conventional arms control and European security. She spent her early government career in DoD/Office of the Secretary of Defense for Policy, where she started out as a presidential management intern in 1988.

Ms. Witkowsky holds a BA in Russian and East European studies from Yale and an MPA, with a concentration in international security, from Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. She is the recipient of State Department Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards, the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Civilian Service, and the Secretary of Defense Medal for Outstanding Public Service.

Rivkin Visser has served as special counsel to the general counsel of the U.S. Department of Defense since 2015. In this role, she advises senior department and U.S. government officials on domestic and international law issues arising in areas including U.S. counterterrorism operations, the law of armed conflict, stability and humanitarian operations, presidential war powers, cyber and electronic warfare activities, authorizations for use of military force, and working with foreign partners, among other issues. She frequently represents the department in U.S. government interagency discussions, in meetings with non-governmental organizations, and briefing members of Congress. 

Rivkin Visser previously worked as a litigation associate in the New York office of Davis Polk & Wardwell, and served as a law clerk to the Hon. Denise Cote in the Southern District of New York and Judge Theodor Meron, president of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague. She earned degrees from Yale (TD 2006), the University of Oxford (2008), and Yale Law School (2011). She is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and is a security fellow with the Truman National Security Project.