President-Elect
Sarah Beran will assume the duties of president of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations on November 11. She had a distinguished 23-year career as a U.S. diplomat, most recently serving as the charge d’affaires and deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. From 2023 to 2024, Ms. Beran served as special assistant to the president and senior director for China and Taiwan Affairs at the White House National Security Council. In this role, she led negotiations for multiple meetings between the U.S. and Chinese presidents, reopened senior diplomatic channels with Beijing in 2023, and crafted the first U.S.-China understanding on AI safety in the context of nuclear command and control.
During her tenure at the State Department, Ms. Beran also served as deputy executive secretary for the Indo-Pacific, led the office responsible for U.S. engagement in Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), and served as director of the office of Chinese and Mongolian Affairs. She was posted overseas in Beijing (twice), Islamabad, Jerusalem, and Quito.
Following Ms. Beran’s career as a diplomat, she spent a year as a partner leading the China practice at Macro Advisory Partners, a geopolitical risk advisory firm, from 2025-2026.
Ms. Beran speaks Mandarin and Spanish. She graduated from Claremont McKenna College with a degree in international relations and Chinese. She is a nonresident senior fellow at University of California San Diego’s 21st Century China Center and a member of the Asia Society’s Task Force on US-China Policy.