“I was in college and living in the chapter house when 9/11 occurred,” Marie recalled. “I remember so distinctly sitting in our TV room watching the news coverage and knowing that's what I wanted to work on. I can see myself sitting there today vividly. And that really solidified for me what I wanted to do with my career, which is come to Washington and work in the government in some way to help in the aftermath of those terrorist attacks.” After graduating from Indiana University in 2003 with a bachelor’s degree in political science and government with focuses in Russian and Eastern European Studies as well as Jewish Studies, Marie immediately went on to earn a master’s degree in foreign affairs from the University of Virginia in 2006. After that, she worked in the Washington D.C. area as an analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) focused on the Middle East – an endeavor inspired by her experience watching the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the Beta Tau chapter house. After being in this
MARIE HARF (Beta Tau-Indiana) On-Air Analyst and Contributor for Fox News Media Executive Director of External Relations and Adjunct Professor at the Georgetown University Walsh School of Foreign Service It takes a certain level of courage to speak your mind, particularly on hot-button topics like politics and global affairs, but it’s something else all together to do that against a panel of experts (mostly men, for that matter) who are making an argument against your opinion. Call it gumption. Call it guts. Call it grit. Whatever you want to call it, there's no doubt that Marie Harf’s (Beta Tau-Indiana) got it. Marie grew up in Granville, Ohio, outside of Columbus. As an only child, she has always been very close to her mother and father, both of whom are professors and do some policy work.
“[Granville] was a wonderful place to grow up, a very idyllic small Midwestern town,” Marie recalled. “I was a cheerleader and played basketball.
role for a couple of years, she moved to the communications side of the agency, serving as a media spokesperson. During her time with the CIA, she witnessed some of the organization’s all-time highs (like the
But because my parents were both either working in policy or academic, in these university-type settings, I had a much broader view of the world and what I was interested in.”
operation against Osama Bin Laden) and lows (including a tragic terrorist attack in Khost, Afghanistan, during which a number of CIA officers were killed).
“I learned how to represent the U.S. government publicly, how a talk about what we're doing overseas and why that should matter to Americans,” Marie said. “And that set me on the rest of my career path.” Since leaving the CIA in 2011, Marie’s primary career goal and focus has been figuring out how to successfully explain to the American people what their government is doing overseas and why that matters to them, from small towns to big cities in small towns across America. Marie went on to work as the associate policy director for national security for President Barack Obama’s reelection campaign where she developed the campaign’s national security policy and communications strategies, served as a campaign spokesperson on these issues and ran the campaign's outside surrogate team that amplified its national security message. Following this campaign, she proceeded to work briefly as the strategic advisor and press spokesperson for former Senator Chuck Hagel (R-NE) during his successful nomination to be Secretary of Defense before joining the U.S. Department of State, first as the deputy spokesperson and then as the senior advisor to Secretary of State John Kerry for strategic communications. In this role, she led strategic and legacy- focused message planning for Secretary Kerry and his top policy priorities, built multi-faceted communications plans to promote the Secretary and the Department’s initiatives and achievements, most notably of which was a robust domestic outreach effort by Secretary Kerry to
Marie’s parents ensured she had every opportunity, including the ability to travel internationally. Her mother also took her to political rallies. This combination with her home of a quaint small town gave her a unique view of the world before moving to Bloomington, Indiana, for college, where both of her parents attended Indiana University, as well. In addition to following in her parents’ footsteps with where she went to college, Marie also chose to carry on a family tradition on her mom’s side by joining a Greek organization on campus. And she knew early in recruitment process she wanted to join Alpha Phi. “When I was a freshman, there were 19 other Greek organizations on campus, and I met them all, but I was drawn to Alpha Phi from the start," Marie recalled. "I met women who were involved in social clubs on campus, who played sports, who were brilliant academically and who were interesting people to meet. When all you have to base an organization off of is a 5-minute conversation, that’s a hard way to judge something, but I knew Alpha Phi was a community I wanted to be a part of.” Alpha Phi whas been an integral part of Marie’s life, particularly throughout her college years and especially at 8:45 a.m. on September 11, 2001, when – in one historic moment – everything seemed to change for Americans everywhere.
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