Dr. Jeffrey Gedmin currently leads Middle East Broadcasting Networks, Inc. (MBN), a non-profit international multimedia corporation funded by the U.S. Government to produce and communicate accurate, objective, timely and relevant news and information about the United States, the region, and the world to Arabic-speaking audience across the Middle East and North Africa. In support of U.S. public diplomacy, MBN operates Alhurra and Alhurra-Iraq television networks, audio content and targeted digital and social media properties.
Gedmin serves on the International Broadcasting Advisory Board (IBAB). The IBAB is an independent federal entity, composed of experts representing mass communications, broadcast media, and international affairs, who provide strategic counsel and oversight in partnership with USAGM’s CEO. Six members are appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. The seventh, the Secretary of State, serves ex officio. He also served as Interim President of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) from July to December 2023.
He is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of American Purpose, the magazine and media venture. He is the former president/CEO of the London-based Legatum Institute. Gedmin served for four years as president/CEO of RFE/RL, prior to which he served as president/CEO of the Aspen Institute in Berlin. Previously, he was a Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., and Executive Director of the New Atlantic Initiative.
Gedmin is the author/editor of several books on Germany and European security. He also served as co-executive producer for two major PBS documentaries: “The Germans, Portrait of a New Nation” (1995) and “Spain’s 9/11 and the Challenge of Radical Islam in Europe” (2007).
He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and serves on several advisory boards, including the Institute for State Effectiveness, the Justice for Journalists Foundation, the Tocqueville Conversations, and the Institute for Current World Affairs. Together with former U.S. Ambassador to the Czech Republic Norm Eisen, Gedmin is co-chair of the Transatlantic Democracy Working Group, hosted by the German Marshall Fund of the United States. He is currently a Research Council Member at the National Endowment for Democracy, senior fellow at Georgetown University and at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue.
He earned his M.A. in German Area Studies from American University. He received his Ph.D. from Georgetown University in German Area Studies and Linguistics.