6/21/2024
12:00 PM - 2:00 PM EST


Location: DACOR Bacon House OR Online, 1801 F Street, NW, Washington, DC 20006

Please note this is a hybrid event - you have the option to attend in person or virtually. Registrations are required for all attendees. For in-person attendees, the event will run from 12 - 2 pm and will include lunch. The live stream will begin shortly after 1 pm (virtual attendees will be sent a link for the event via email).

All those interested in Latin America and the Caribbean are welcome to attend LAC Luncheons. Discussions are organized around theme, country, region or on a selected speaker’s interests and occur monthly.

Join us for a conversation with Ambassador Tony Wayne, former U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, and Ms. Rachel Poynter, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Mexico and Canada, Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, U.S. Department of State, on the upcoming elections in Mexico.

Rachel Poynter, a career member of the Senior Executive Service, is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for North America, covering our bilateral relationships with Mexico and Canada. She most recently served as the Director of the Office of Policy Planning and Coordination in the Western Hemisphere Affairs Bureau, where she coordinated the Bureau’s work on regional and global issues, foreign assistance planning in Latin America and the Caribbean, congressional affairs and hemispheric strategy development. Ms. Poynter previously served as the Director of the Office of Mexican Affairs and the Department’s U.S.-Mexico Border Coordinator. She was the Director for North American Affairs at the National Security Council from 2013-14, a portfolio that included preparing the President for his participation in the North American Leaders Summit. Ms. Poynter spent five years working in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs at the U.S. Department of State and was a Brookings Fellow with the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, where she worked on trade issues. She has a Master of Public Affairs and a Master of Arts in Latin American Studies, both from the University of Texas at Austin.

Earl Anthony Wayne is the Hurst Senior Professorial Lecturer and Distinguished Diplomat in Residence, Foreign Policy & Global Security at American University. In addition to his role at AU, Wayne is a Public Policy Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and Co-Chair of its Mexico Institute Advisory Board. He is a Senior Non-Resident Adviser at the Atlantic Council and at the Center for Security and International Studies. Ambassador Wayne served as a U.S. diplomat from 1975 to 2015, including as Ambassador to Argentina (2006-2009), Coordinating Director for Development and Economic Affairs and Deputy Ambassador in Kabul, Afghanistan (2009-2011), and Ambassador to Mexico (2011-15). He was Assistant Secretary of State for Economic and Business Affairs (EB) under three Secretaries of State (2000-2006) and Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Europe (1997-2000). The U.S. Senate confirmed him as a Career Ambassador, the highest rank in the US Foreign Service, in 2010. He received multiple honors during his government service, including the 2017 Director General’s Cup for the Foreign Service and the 2015 Cobb Award for Initiative and Success in Trade Development.

Ambassador Wayne has an MPA from Harvard University’s JFK School of Government, MAs from Princeton University and Stanford University (Political Science), and a BA (Political Science) from the University of California, Berkeley.