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Burns spent 33 years in the US Foreign Service, concluding with his tenure during the Obama administration as the second-ever career diplomat to serve as deputy secretary of state. After retiring in 2014, Burns became the president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he wrote often about how the US could better conduct diplomacy which is why he was considered a potential secretary of state pick.
It’s precisely such a background that makes Burns an outside-the-box selection for CIA chief: If confirmed, he’d be the first lifelong diplomat to serve in that role.
Burns worked as an ambassador to the United States' old Cold War adversary from 2005 to 2008 and led secret talks that paved the way to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, under former Democratic President Barack Obama.
President-elect Joe Biden has nominated career diplomat William Burns to serve as director of the Central Intelligence Agency, claiming that Americans will “sleep soundly” with Burns at the helm of the shadowy intel service.
WASHINGTON: US President-elect Joe Biden will nominate longtime former career diplomat William Burns to lead the CIA, his transition team said in a statement on Monday. Burns, a former deputy US secretary of state who served 33 years as a US diplomat, is currently the president of the international affairs think tank the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.