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Panelist Bios

MAURA HARTY is Assistant Secretary of Consular Affairs at the US Department of State. She has served in that capacity since November 21, 2002. Prior to assuming the position in Consular Affairs, she served as the Executive Secretary of the Department of State.

Ambassador Harty entered the Foreign Service in 1981, after receiving a bachelor's degree from the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. Following an initial assignment to the American Embassy in Mexico City, she later served as a Watch Officer in the State Department's Operations Center and was promoted to Senior Watch Officer during that assignment. In 1987-1988, she was a Special Assistant to then Secretary of State George P. Shultz.

Ambassador Harty returned overseas in 1988 as Chief of the non-immigrant visa section in Bogota, Colombia. Subsequently, she served as Consul at the American Embassy in Madrid. During that time she also assisted in the opening of the American Embassy in Vilnius, Lithuania.

In 1994, she served as the Managing Director of the Directorate of Overseas Citizens Services, where she created the office of Children's Issues. A year later, she was selected as a Deputy Executive Secretary of the Department and subsequently served as Executive Assistant to Secretary of State Warren Christopher. Following that assignment, she became the US Ambassador to the Republic of Paraguay.

WENDY D. WHITE is Director of the Board on International Scientific Organizations (BISO) at the US National Academy of Sciences. Her interests include analyzing the ways in which scientists approach and use information and the impact of information and communication technologies on the traditional scientific methods for obtaining, organizing, and archiving the scientific record.

Since joining the staff of The National Academies in 1979, she has worked on and developed scientific networks in more than 40 countries in Europe, Asia, Latin America, and Africa. From 1989-1996, Ms. White directed a project that examined the ways in which information and communication technologies could improve scientific collaboration in Africa and among African researchers and their colleagues in other countries. Prior to that, Ms. White worked for the Board on Science and Technology for International Development.

She currently serves on the Information Services Advisory Board for Macalester College and on the Advisory Council for the International Network for the Availability of Scientific Publications, an organization that promotes worldwide access to information and knowledge. In 2002, Ms. White was elected to the Board of Trustees for the International Foundation for Science.

JONATHAN GINSBURG is a Member of Fettmann, Tolchin & Majors PC, in Fairfax, VA. Mr. Ginsburg also chairs the American Immigration Lawyers Association's Department of State Liaison Committee, and serves as a panelist or moderator in the O and P (entertainment and sports related activities) extraordinary ability and consular practice areas for AILA and numerous arts-related organizations.

He received his law degree from Stanford University, and practices immigration law full-time, specializing in US work-related immigrant and nonimmigrant benefits. Mr. Ginsburg has worked with the US national arts service organizations for over a decade, and he is a leading expert on O and P provisions and their implementing regulations. He has written or edited articles on the subject for the American Immigration Lawyers Association Immigration & Nationality Law Handbook and for other publications, and is the author of the immigration portion of the web site www.artistsfromabroad.org.

MODERATOR

DORIS MEISSNER is a Senior Fellow at the Migration Policy Institute. She contributes to MPI's project on national security and immigration and conducts policy research on international migration and development, and immigration policymaking in an era of globalization. Ms. Meissner served as US Immigration and Naturalization Service Commissioner at the US Department of Justice from October 1993 to November 2000. Her accomplishments include reforming the nation's asylum system; creating new strategies for managing US borders in the context of open trade; improving services for immigrants; managing migration and humanitarian crises firmly and compassionately; and strengthening cooperation and joint initiatives with Mexico, Canada, and other countries. In 1989, Ms. Meissner founded the Carnegie Endowment's International Migration Policy Program, which evolved into the Migration Policy Institute in 2001. She left the Carnegie Endowment in 1993 when President Bill Clinton tapped her to serve as INS Commissioner. After leaving government in 2000, she returned to the Carnegie Endowment as a senior associate in the Global Policy Program.