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Former Kerry staffer headed to State Department

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s top professional staffer on arms trade issues is leaving Capitol Hill to take up a position in the State Department, The Cable has learned. Greg Kausner is moving over to the State Department’s Political-Military Bureau to become the new deputy assistant secretary of state for regional security and arms transfers, ...

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s top professional staffer on arms trade issues is leaving Capitol Hill to take up a position in the State Department, The Cable has learned.

Greg Kausner is moving over to the State Department’s Political-Military Bureau to become the new deputy assistant secretary of state for regional security and arms transfers, he told friends in an e-mail obtained by The Cable. A former naval aviator, Kausner traveled with Kerry when he worked at the Senate Navy Liaison office and then Kerry hired him to work on the SFRC staff. His last day on the Hill was April 5.

We’re also hearing from multiple sources that SFRC nuclear and non-proliferation expert Anthony Wier is headed over to State in the coming weeks to work on nuclear issues, but Wier did not respond to a request for comment. The State Department declined a request for comment and SFRC Spokeswoman Tricia Enright said only that a replacement for Kausner has not yet been hired.

Kausner will be working for Assistant Secretary Andrew Shapiro, a former Senate staffer for Hillary Clinton. Shapiro is departing Foggy Bottom soon; he’s one of the few "Hillaryland" officials left in Foggy Bottom.

There are still several former Kerry employees waiting on Capitol Hill to see if they will get jobs at State. So far, Kerry has brought only a handful of his own people to the State Department and several other top jobs have been filled by White House, Obama campaign, or outside personnel.

There are signs, however, that the State Department may be moving forward on filling some of the scores of vacant mid- and senior-level positions around the department. State Department Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland announced April 5 that she will no longer be conducting the daily briefings, perhaps to prepare for her expected appointment as assistant secretary of state for Europe.

Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.

Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.

A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.

Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin

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