Ms. Curtis served as Deputy Assistant to the President and NSC Senior Director for South and Central Asia from 2017-2021 under three successive National Security Advisors. During her tenure at the NSC, she coordinated U.S. policy development and implementation of the South Asia Strategy approved by the President in 2017 and was a key contributor to the Indo-Pacific Strategic Framework, which included expanding Quad security cooperation. She coordinated policies designed to strengthen the U.S.-India defense, diplomatic, and trade partnership, resulting in a widely recognized elevation of the relationship. Ms. Curtis also coordinated development of the U.S. Strategy toward Central Asia, to include facilitating new partnerships with Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.

From 2006–2017, Ms. Curtis was Senior Fellow on South Asia at The Heritage Foundation, where her responsibilities included research, writing, regular media appearances, and frequent Congressional testimony. She also served as Professional Staff Member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, handling the South Asia portfolio for former Chairman of the Committee, Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) from 2003–2006. Before that, she worked as a Senior Advisor in the South Asia Bureau at the State Department, where she developed and coordinated U.S. policy on India-Pakistan relations. In the late 1990s, she worked as a senior analyst on South Asia at the CIA, and from 1994–1998 served at the U.S. Embassies in Pakistan and India.

Ms. Curtis has published commentary in Foreign Policy, The National Interest, CNN.com, NPR.org, and other media outlets and made multiple appearances on CNN, Fox News, BBC, PBS, MSNBC, and C-SPAN.

Ms. Curtis received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Indiana University in December 1990.

Richard Fontaine is the Chief Executive Officer of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). He served as President of CNAS from 2012-19 and as Senior Advisor and Senior Fellow from 2009-12. Prior to CNAS, he was foreign policy advisor to Senator John McCain and worked at the State Department, the National Security Council, and on the staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Mr. Fontaine served as foreign policy advisor to the McCain 2008 presidential campaign and subsequently as the minority deputy staff director on the Senate Armed Services Committee. Prior to that, he served as Associate Director for Near Eastern Affairs at the National Security Council (NSC) from 2003-04. He also worked on Southeast Asian issues in the NSC’s Asian Affairs directorate.

At the State Department, Mr. Fontaine worked in the office of Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and in the department’s South Asia bureau. Mr. Fontaine began his foreign policy career as a staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, focusing on the Middle East and South Asia. He also spent a year teaching English in Japan.

Mr. Fontaine currently serves as Executive Director of the Trilateral Commission and has been an adjunct professor in the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.

A native of New Orleans, Mr. Fontaine graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in International Relations from Tulane University. He also holds a M.A. in International Affairs from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington, and he attended Oxford University. He lives in Virginia with his wife and their four children.

Prior to joining the HASC, Sarah served in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (OSDP) in Nuclear and Missile Defense, Koreas, Brazil, and Space Policy offices. At OSDP she was responsible for the development and implementation of several international strategies, negotiation of international agreements, as well as planning, programming, budgeting, and execution of Defense of Defense programs.

She previously served in the Office of the Under Secretary of the Air Force for International Affairs (SAF/IA) as an international affairs specialist. At SAF/IA she was responsible for the development and implementation of the Air Force’s international engagement strategy for space.

Sarah started her career as an intelligence analyst for the National Air and Space Intelligence Center in Dayton, Ohio. She was the lead employment analyst on foreign counterspace systems including space situational awareness sensors, directed energy, and kinetic kill vehicle systems.

Sarah holds a Masters in Public and International Affairs and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the University of Pittsburgh.

She is happily married to the best space lawyer in the United States, Dr. Michael Mineiro, and together they have two wonder-filled and wonderful children. In her spare time she paints, reads comic books, and plucks a guitar.