Press Release - President Biden Announces Ten Key Nominations

WASHINGTON – Today, President Joe Biden announced his intent to nominate the following ten individuals to serve in key roles:

• María Luisa Pagán, Nominee for Deputy United States Trade Representative, Geneva Office
• Christopher Wilson, Nominee for Chief Innovation and Intellectual Property Negotiator, Office of the United States Trade Representative
• Leopoldo Martinez, Nominee for Executive Director of the Inter-American Development Bank
• M. Fabiana Jorge, Nominee for Alternate Executive Director of the Inter-American Development Bank
• Sasha Baker, Nominee for Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy
• Sean Coffey, Nominee for General Counsel of the Department of the Navy
• Sarah H. Cleveland, Nominee for Legal Adviser of the Department of State
• Joshua Frost, Nominee for Assistant Secretary for Financial Markets, Department of the Treasury
• Amy Loyd, Nominee for Assistant Secretary for Career, Technical, and Adult Education, Department of Education
• Sam Slater, Member of the Board of Directors of the Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority

María Luisa Pagán, Nominee for Deputy United States Trade Representative, Geneva Office
María L. Pagán has spent almost three decades as a trade lawyer in the U.S. government.  She is currently the Deputy General Counsel at the Office of the United States Trade Representative.  In that role, she provides legal advice to senior USTR officials on all legal aspects regarding trade negotiations, implementation of trade agreements, and trade related legislation and regulations.  She has been the lead U.S. attorney for numerous trade agreement negotiations.  She was the lead lawyer for the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, handling the legal aspects of the negotiation, as well as the implementation package that passed Congress in early 2020.   Before becoming Deputy General Counsel, she specialized in providing legal advice on services, government procurement, and the section 421 country-specific safeguard, and also litigated several disputes before the WTO.  Prior to joining USTR in 2003, Ms. Pagán worked as an attorney advisor in the Office of the Chief Counsel for International Commerce at the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Ms. Pagán was born and raised in Puerto Rico, and resides in Maryland.  She received her law degree and a Master's in Foreign Service from Georgetown University, and a B.A. from Tufts University.  

Christopher Wilson, Nominee for Chief Innovation and Intellectual Property Negotiator, Office of the United States Trade Representative
Christopher Wilson is a 20-year veteran of the Office of the United States Trade Representative, where he has served in a variety of trade policy leadership roles, including Deputy Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Innovation and Intellectual Property (2006-2008) and several Assistant U.S. Trade Representative positions.  Wilson's USTR experience encompasses periods focused on regional trade relationships with Latin America, Europe and the Middle East, and South and Central Asia.  He has represented USTR at the U.S. Mission to the European Union, and at the U.S. Mission to the World Trade Organization as Deputy U.S. Permanent Representative.  Prior to his USTR service, Wilson worked at the Commerce Department's International Trade Administration and as a State Department Foreign Service Officer (with assignments in Africa and Southeast Asia).  He also spent several years consulting on trade policy issues in the private sector.  A native of Kansas and longtime resident of Washington, D.C., Wilson is married to Mark Hegedus.

Leopoldo Martinez, Nominee for United States Executive Director of the Inter-American Development Bank
Leopoldo Martinez Nucete is a Venezuelan-American international lawyer, writer, and social entrepreneur. He is also a former Congressman in Venezuela. He is the Founder of the Center for Democracy and Development in the Americas, publishers of IQ Latino, and the Principal of LMN Consulting, LLC. Mr. Martínez is a member the Democratic National Committee (DNC), one of the leaders of its Hispanic Caucus, and a founding Board Member of Latino Victory Project. 

Mr. Martinez served on the Small Business Legislative Commission of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and currently sits on the University Of Mary Washington Board of Visitors and the Sorensen Institute at the University of Virginia. He also served in the Transition Committee for Virginia Governor Ralph Northam. Leopoldo Martínez is a graduate of Harvard Law School ('89), Princeton University School of Public and International Affairs ('96), and The University of Miami Law School ('07). Mr. Martinez has worked with large international law and accounting firms, and has extensive experience advising Fortune 500 companies, private equity funds, Multi-Latina corporations, international business, and non-profit organizations.

M. Fabiana Jorge, Nominee for United States Alternate Executive Director of the Inter-American Development Bank
M. Fabiana Jorge is the founder and president of MFJ International, a global consulting firm based in Washington, DC that specializes in international trade and business. Ms. Jorge has three decades of experience in trade negotiations with a focus on intellectual property and access to medicines.  She has been deeply involved in many trade negotiations, including the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), the New Trade Policy of 2007, the Dominican Republic-Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA-DR), the EU-Canada Comprehensive and Trade Agreement (CETA), the EU-Mercosur Trade Agreement, and most recently in the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). 

Ms. Jorge was previously a Principal at Verner, Liipfert, Bernhard, McPherson and Hand, where she was the head of the Latin American Affairs Division.  She was an adjunct professor at the University of El Salvador in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where she was born.  She holds a Bachelor degree in Political Science with a Specialization in International Relations from Catholic University in Buenos Aires.  She has a Masters in Business Administration from Columbia University.  Ms. Jorge is fluent in Spanish and French and has working knowledge of Portuguese. She moved to the United States over 30 years ago and resides in Washington, DC with her husband Doug and three kids, Christopher, Phillip and Nicole.

Sasha Baker, Nominee for Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy
Sasha Baker currently serves as a Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Strategic Planning at the National Security Council. Previously, Ms. Baker served as national security advisor for Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, and as Deputy Chief of Staff for Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter during the Obama administration. She was a budget analyst at the Office of Management and Budget, joining the civil service as a Presidential Management Fellow and serving in the Homeland Security and National Security divisions and later as Special Assistant to the OMB Director. Ms. Baker began her public service career with the House Armed Services Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, where she supported bipartisan congressional reviews on a variety of national security topics.

A New Jersey native, Ms. Baker earned a B.A. from Dartmouth College and a Master in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School, where she was a fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. She is a recipient of the Department of Defense Distinguished Public Service Medal.

John "Sean" Coffey, Nominee for General Counsel of the Department of the Navy
John P. ("Sean") Coffey is a retired Navy captain and former federal prosecutor who currently serves as the Chair of Complex Litigation at Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP in New York City.  The oldest of seven children born to Irish immigrants, Coffey is an honors graduate of the United States Naval Academy and Georgetown University Law Center.  After graduating from Annapolis, Coffey completed Naval Flight Officer training and served eight years on active duty, including assignments as a P-3C Orion mission commander, junior officer intern to the Organization of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and personal military assistant to Vice President George H.W. Bush.  After completing Georgetown Law's evening program while assigned to the Pentagon and White House, Coffey transitioned to the Navy Reserve and returned home to New York to begin his legal career.  Coffey has over three decades of active, high-profile trial experience, including serving as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York and, in private practice, as co-lead trial counsel in the landmark WorldCom securities case.  While practicing law in New York, Coffey continued to serve for eighteen years in the Navy Reserve, where he commanded a reserve P-3C squadron and the reserve component of the Enterprise carrier battle group staff, and served as a staff officer in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. He retired at the rank of Captain in 2004 after thirty years of uniformed service. 

Coffey has long been active in philanthropic and educational efforts.  He is currently the president of the Federal Bar Foundation, a not-for-profit that supports law-related programs located in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. He also serves on the boards of the Holocaust & Human Rights Education Center, Common Cause New York, and ThanksUSA, a not-for-profit that provides scholarships for military dependents.  Coffey is also a member of the board of visitors at Georgetown Law, where he has taught trial practice as an adjunct professor. 

Sarah H. Cleveland, Nominee for Legal Adviser of the Department of State
Sarah H. Cleveland is an American law professor and expert in international law and the constitutional law of U.S. foreign relations.  A native of Alabama, she holds the Louis Henkin Chair in Human and Constitutional Rights and is Faculty Co-Director of the Human Rights Institute at Columbia Law School. She previously served as the Co-Coordinating Reporter of the American Law Institute's Restatement (Fourth) of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States (2018), and as Counselor on International Law to the Legal Adviser of the U.S. Department of State.  She was nominated by the U.S. government and served as an independent expert on the United Nations Human Rights Committee (2015-18) and the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe (2013-19). Cleveland began her career as a Skadden Fellow representing migrant farmworkers with Florida Legal Services, and then joined the faculty at the University of Texas School of Law. The author of numerous publications, she also has taught at Oxford, Harvard, Michigan, Sciences Po Paris, Paris II Panthéon-Assas, and the European University Institute, Florence.  She earned a Bachelor's Degree with honors at Brown University (Junior Phi Beta Kappa); a Master's Degree at Oxford University, where she studied as a Rhodes Scholar; and a J.D. at Yale University Law School.  She clerked for Judge Louis F. Oberdorfer on the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, and then for Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun.

Joshua Frost, Nominee for Assistant Secretary for Financial Markets, Department of the Treasury
Josh Frost has spent nearly 23 years at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, most recently as the co-chair of the liquidity risk program for large bank supervision. He also oversaw the two Corporate Credit Facilities launched in response to the pandemic. Josh is currently on a detail assignment from the New York Fed to the U.S. Department of the Treasury to provide temporary assistance. Prior roles at the New York Fed included Director of Money Markets and Director of Treasury Markets, where he was responsible for the teams that launched the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR), and conducted auctions of debt on behalf of the U.S. Department of the Treasury.

Mr. Frost received his MBA in Finance from New York University and his BA in Mathematics and Psychology from Rutgers College.

Amy Loyd, Nominee for Assistant Secretary for Career, Technical, and Adult Education, Department of Education
Amy Loyd, Ed.L.D., is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy and Strategic Initiatives in the Office of Career, Technical, and Adult Education at the U.S. Department of Education.  She oversees national programs related to career and technical education, community colleges, adult education and literacy, and correctional education.

Prior to joining the Biden-Harris Administration, Dr. Loyd was a Vice President at Jobs for the Future (JFF), where she designed and led programs across the United States that improve education and workforce outcomes. Her work at JFF focused on state and regional policies, practices, and cross-sector partnerships that engaged K-12 education, community colleges, adult education, workforce development, economic development, and employers to build systems of college and career pathways. She also oversaw JFF's work in workforce development with a lens on economic advancement, state and federal policy, and diversity, equity, and inclusion. She previously was the Director of Education at Cook Inlet Tribal Council, leading a network of schools providing culturally responsive education, training, and wraparound services to the Alaska Native and Native American communities. Dr. Loyd attended Santa Fe Community College and Northern New Mexico Community College, and holds a bachelor's degree from St. John's College and a doctorate in education leadership from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, where she was an adjunct lecturer on building career pathways to increase opportunity and equity.

Sam Slater, Nominee for Member of the Board of Directors of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority
Sam Slater is a Managing Partner at Tremont Asset Management LLC, which owns and manages a diversified portfolio of apartments, commercial, industrial, and agricultural properties throughout the United States and Canada. He directly manages the acquisition, development, and finance of all real estate assets. Slater is a co-owner of the Seattle Kraken and the Climate Pledge Arena and serves on the board of the team. He serves on the Board of Overseers at both The New England Aquarium and The Boston Children's Museum and is a director of The Slater Foundation. Additionally, in 2012, Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick appointed Slater to the Board of Directors of The Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency that funds cultural, arts, and interpretive science programs throughout the state.

As a Co-Founder and Partner at Burn Later Productions, Slater has produced over thirty feature films that have been distributed by Paramount, Sony Pictures, Universal, and Netflix, among others. He is a member of the Producers Guild of America. In addition, he is a frequent guest lecturer at the Communications School at Northeastern University. Slater graduated from The George Washington University with a Bachelor of Arts in History and earned his Master's in Public Administration at Suffolk University.