Ted Sorensen

Fall 2002
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TED SORENSEN, who served for 11 years as policy adviser, legal counsel and speech writer to Senator and President John F. Kennedy, deeply involved in such matters as the Cuban Missile Crisis, civil rights legislation, and the decision to go to the moon, has since 1966 practiced international law at one of New York's most prominent law firms, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison. Now Senior Counsel, his practice focuses on international business and governmental transactions in all parts of the world. His work has taken him to more than 85 countries and to meetings with over 60 heads of government and state.

Assignments have been received over the years from a wide variety of clients, ranging from the United Nations to foreign governments, and from U.S. and foreign corporations to international foundations. Former Chairman of the firm's International Practice Committee, Mr. Sorensen is a member of the bar in New York, Nebraska, the District of Columbia and the United States Supreme Court. He currently serves on the boards of the Council on Foreign Relations, The Century Foundation, and the International Center for Transitional Justice, and is Chairman of the International Advisory Board for the International Center for Ethics, Justice and Public Life at Brandeis University.

Sorensen previously served as a director of the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs and the Central Asian American Enterprise Fund, and as a member of the President's Commission on White House Fellows. He is the author of the 1965 book Kennedy, an international best seller, Why I am a Democrat (1996), six other books on the Presidency, politics or foreign policy, and numerous articles on those subjects in Foreign Affairs, The New York Times and other publications. He has lectured widely in the U.S. and abroad to business, academic, military, political, religious and other audiences. He has participated in nine of the last twelve Democratic Party National Conventions, and has served in a number of governmental, political and civic posts

Disclaimer: This information is accurate for the time period that this person was affiliated with the Institute of Politics.

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