Podesta Group snags State Department deputy assistant secretary

John Hudson

Lobbying powerhouse the Podesta Group has hired StateDepartment Deputy Assistant Secretary BayFang, The Cable has learned.
The hire, set to be announced later today, adds to the firm's expandinginternational practice, which has serviced clients ranging from the Georgian toEgyptian governments.
"It's a growing part of their practice," Fang told The Cable, speaking of the firm's roleas an interlocutor between foreign governments and the United States. "So I'mtalking to a lot of my former colleagues both in the press and at the StateDepartment."
Fang left her post at the Bureau of European and EurasianAffairs last month and started in earnest last Monday as a senior strategist.
At State, she traveled to Caucasus countries including Georgia,Azerbaijan, and Armenia as well as the Balkans, working on cultural outreachand programs focusing on youth entrepreneurship in post-Soviet economies. Shealso served as a senior advisor for the State Department in southernAfghanistan and before that was the diplomatic correspondent for the Chicago Tribune.
Her addition to Podesta Group comes as the firm adds William Bohlen, the former director ofcommunications for the German Marshall Fund of the United States, as anothersenior strategist.
"The accelerated growth we've enjoyed within our internationalsector has shown no signs of slowing down," CEO Kimberley Fritts said in a memo. "Bay and Will further cement thediplomatic experience, communications savvy and relationship advantage thatonly we can provide, and that our clients require to be successful on the worldstage."

source: thecable.foreignpolicy.com