Varina Winder

Varina Winder is the Chief of Staff for the Secretary of State’s Office of Global Women’s Issues (S/GWI) at the Department of State, where she leads the office’s policy development, interagency coordination, and strategic operations. Prior to returning to the Department, she served as the Senior Manager for Global Partnerships and Strategic Engagement at Family Planning 2020, a partnership housed at the United Nations Foundation. She was previously its Chief of Staff. She rejoins government having served previously as Senior Policy Advisor in S/GWI. She has also worked in the office of the Deputy Secretary for Management and Resources, at the U.S. Embassy in Bogota, and on the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration’s Gender and Youth team. Varina holds a master’s degree in public policy from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and Bachelors’ degrees in English and Spanish from Georgetown University. She speaks fluent Spanish.