Ms. Sarah Charles
Senior Director for Humanitarian Policy and Advocacy at the International Rescue Committee
Ms. Sarah Charles is the Senior Director for Humanitarian Policy and Advocacy at the International Rescue Committee (IRC). Ms. Charles leads IRC’s efforts to drive systematic reforms in the humanitarian aid system and promote policies to improve the lives of refugees and other conflict-affected persons. Prior to her current role with IRC, Ms. Charles spent four years on the National Security Council Staff at the White House, first as the Director for Humanitarian Policy and then as the Director and Acting Senior Director for Strategic Planning. As Director of Strategic Planning, Ms. Charles coordinated the White House response to the global refugee and migration crisis and co-led the planning of President Obama’s Leaders Summit on Refugees. She was additionally responsible for prioritizing national security initiatives and ensuring that defense and foreign affairs budgets and spending reflected those priorities. As Director of Humanitarian Policy from 2013 to 2015, Ms. Charles coordinated policy and humanitarian assistance worldwide. She served in the role during a time marked by a historic number of concurrent and complex crises and played a signficiant role in shaping the United States response to complex emergencies in Syria, Iraq, Central African Republic and South Sudan as well as natural disasters, in the Philippines and elsewhere. Ms. Charles played a particularly central role in shaping and coordinating the international Ebola response. Before the White House, Ms. Charles covered the Middle East for the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI), the United States government’s primary political transition and post-conflict assistance instrument. Ms. Charles previously worked with the IRC in field posts throughout East Africa and Central Asia. Among other overseas positions, Ms. Charles helped start IRC’s emergency response in Darfur and led multi-country refugee repatriation efforts following the signing of the Sudanese Comprehensive Peace Agreement. Her overseas experience includes the Middle East, Afghanistan, East Africa and Central Europe. Ms. Charles holds a Bachelor of Arts in Government and Geography from Dartmouth College and a Masters in Public Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University. She lives in Chevy Chase with her husband and three young children.