Reuben Jeffery III
Reuben Jeffery III | |
|---|---|
| Born | August 21, 1953 |
| Occupation(s) | Businessman, government official |
| Known for | United States Under Secretary of State for Economic, Business, and Agricultural Affairs; President and CEO of Rockefeller & Co. |
Reuben Jeffery III (born August 21, 1953) previously held the position of United States Under Secretary of State for Economic, Business, and Agricultural Affairs, a role to which he was appointed by President George W. Bush in June 2007. He is presently the President, CEO, and a board member at Rockefeller & Co. and Rockefeller Financial Services, Inc., and also participates on the International Advisory Committee of J. Rothschild Capital Management Limited.
Early life
Born on August 21, 1953, Jeffery completed his undergraduate studies in Political Science at Yale University in 1975. He then entered Morgan Guaranty Trust Company's management program based in New York City. Subsequently, he earned a joint JD/MBA degree from Stanford University in 1981.
Career
Jeffery’s professional journey began at Davis Polk & Wardwell before he joined Goldman Sachs in 1983. He advanced to Managing Partner of Goldman Sachs's European Financial Institutions Group located in London in 1992 and later assumed leadership of the firm’s Paris office in 1997.
Having supported George W. Bush’s presidential campaign in 2000, Jeffery was appointed Special Advisor for Lower Manhattan Development following the events of September 11. He left Goldman Sachs in 2002 to dedicate himself fully to this assignment. In 2003, he served as an advisor to L. Paul Bremer within the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq and acted as its Representative and Executive Director at the Pentagon.
Until 2005, Jeffery held the position of Senior Director for International Economic Affairs at the U.S. National Security Council. He currently holds a seat on Barclays’ Board of Directors.
In 2005, he was appointed Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. President Bush nominated him for the Under Secretary of State role overseeing Economic, Business, and Agricultural Affairs in April 2007; following Senate confirmation that June, he was sworn into office by Secretary Condoleezza Rice.
From 2010 through 2018, Jeffery led Rockefeller & Co., a New York-based asset management company, as its President and CEO.
In political contributions, he gave $32,000 to Romney Victory Inc. in 2012 and signed an amicus brief endorsing same-sex marriage during the Hollingsworth v. Perry case in 2013.
Currently, Jeffery is a senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and serves on the board of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni.
Personal life
Jeffery is married to Robin Jeffery, with whom he has three children.