Hon. Yleem Poblete, Ph.D.

Yleem D.S. Poblete is a national security and foreign policy expert, writer, and strategist. She is a co-founder of Poblete Analysis Group and a contributing author of Poblete Dispatches, an independent publication on politics, law, and power.

Yleem’s work is driven by a single conviction: that the defense of liberty, human dignity, and the rule of law requires people who understand how power actually operates — and are willing to say so clearly.

That conviction has taken her from the halls of Congress to the highest levels of the executive branch, and from multilateral negotiating tables to independent advisory work. Her expertise spans arms control and nonproliferation, weapons of mass destruction, strategic security and deterrence, Western Hemisphere affairs, and Middle East policy — two regional concentrations she has pursued with equal depth across her entire career.

In government, Dr. Poblete served as Assistant Secretary of State for Verification and Compliance — confirmed unanimously by the U.S. Senate — where she was the lead U.S. Presidential appointee on arms control, nonproliferation, and disarmament treaties and executive agreements.

Dr. Poblete has led a multi-disciplinary team of civilian, military, intelligence, technical, and scientific experts; oversaw U.S. missions abroad; and directed programs to develop technologies enhancing U.S. monitoring and detection capabilities across conventional, nuclear, radiological, chemical, and biological weapons domains, and activities in the undersea and outer space environments. Prior to that appointment, she served in the Senior Executive Service at the Department of State and on the National Security Council transition teams for the 2016 presidential transition.

On Capitol Hill, she served for years as Chief of Staff and Staff Director of the U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, leading the development, drafting, and negotiation of major foreign policy legislation across every region and functional issue area. National Journal recognized her as one of the “14 Top Women on the Hill” in 2011 and among a handful of minority senior staff leaders in the House and Senate.

Dr. Poblete’s analytical reach extends across academia, think tanks, international financial institutions, and the White House. She has been published in The Wall Street Journal, The National Interest, The Hill, The Washington Times, The Times of Israel, and World Affairs Journal, and is a sought-after expert commentator for U.S. and international media. She serves on the boards of educational and foreign policy advocacy organizations and lectures at universities and foreign policy conferences worldwide.

A native Spanish speaker with professional proficiency and basic competency in French, she brings both linguistic range and lived experience to her analysis of Latin America and the broader Western Hemisphere. She and her husband Jason are active members of the Order of Malta.

---

A sampling of Recent Presentations, Articles & Publications

• “Challenges to Security in Space: Space Reliance in an Era of Competition and Expansion,” quoted, Defense Intelligence Agency (2022).
• “Space Traffic Management in the New Space Age,” quoted, United States Air Force, Strategic Studies Quarterly (May 2020).
• “International Law and Security in Outer Space: Now and Tomorrow,” quoted, American Journal of International Law, Emory University (May 17, 2019).
• Remarks on Recent Russian Space Activities of Concern, Conference on Disarmament, Geneva, Switzerland (May 7, 2019).
• Statement by Assistant Secretary Poblete at the Conference on Disarmament, Geneva, Switzerland (Mar. 19, 2019).
• The US Criticizes Russia as Serial Violator of Arms Control Treaties, Voice of America (Mar. 19, 2019).
• Russia’s Concerning Behavior in Space, Remarks at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (Aug. 17, 2018).
• Space Force talk drawing attention to the need for international norms, quoted, Space News (Aug. 15, 2018).
• Assistant Secretary Poblete Addresses the Conference on Disarmament, Geneva, Switzerland (Aug. 14, 2018).