Our Team

Aaron Sampson is a former U.S. Foreign Service Officer. His overseas assignments with the U.S. Department of State included serving as General Services Officer in Guinea, Political and Economic Section Chief in Mali, Political and Economic Section Chief in Uganda, and Political Counselor and Acting Deputy Chief of Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). In Washington he served as Special Assistant to Assistant Secretary for African Affairs, Africa Director in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, coordinator of the U.S. government’s interagency task force on wildlife trafficking, and a course instructor at the Foreign Service Institute. From 2022 to 2024 he was detailed from the State Department to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s Africa team. He was a Peace Corps volunteer in Gabon and Madagascar and has also worked in Djibouti, Mauritania, and South Africa. He holds an undergraduate degree in English from Cornell University, an MPA in policy analysis from Indiana University, and an MA in comparative politics from American University. He is from St. Paul, Minnesota.