THE DIFFICULT ROLES OF AMERICA’S BLACK DIPLOMATS
ON JUNE 1, AN HOUR AFTER POLICE TEAR-GASSED PROTESTERS outside the White House to clear the way for a photo-op for U.S. President Donald Trump, a top-ranking diplomat sent an email to State Department employees alluding to police violence and racism that sparked nationwide demonstrations.
“This past week, we have seen the difficult images across our country triggered by the horrifying events in Minnesota. As Americans, it is a difficult moment for all of us,” Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun wrote in the note, obtained by foreign policy. “To that end, I have encouraged Department leaders … to open dialogues with their teams and create opportunities to share experiences as we reflect on how these experiences impact our communities and as we strive to represent American values in our work.”
The email was meant to send a message to State Department employees that senior leaders acknowledged the challenges of racial injustice and police brutality in the United States after the killing of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minnesota on May 25. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo added his own thoughts in an email to employees on June 10—16 days after Floyd’s killing—condemning his death as a “tragedy” and saying the country’s “civic unrest gives us an extraordinary opportunity to tell our story abroad.”
But for some State Department officials, particularly Black diplomats and other diplomats of color, these messages fell flat. As a broader swath of Americans reckon with racism in a new way, the signals coming out of Foggy Bottom to America’s diplomatic corps seem to be more of the same: a belated handful of emails to employees from senior officials calling for fresh dialogue, rehashing stale pledges to diversify the U.S. diplomatic corps, and committing to root out prejudice and bias that have plagued the department for decades.
Floyd’s death has laid bare how injustices at home can disarm American diplomats trying to advocate for human rights and rule of law in foreign countries. But it has also resurfaced the
