Who Is Philip Gordon, Harris’s National Security Advisor?

By Samuel Dempsey. Originally published on 21 August 2024 by CEPA on its website.

With Vice President Kamala Harris now the Democratic nominee against former President Trump, eyes are on Harris’s national security adviser, Philip Gordon.

It’s early days to be picking a possible President’s possible top team, but current and former officials have told the Wall Street Journal that the current National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan likely “wouldn’t be extended in [his] current role” if Kamala Harris wins in November. Step forward Philip Gordon, Harris’s top foreign policy advisor? That seems likely.

Gordon, 61, has broad expertise in Europe, is firmly behind Ukraine, but has advocated for a European NATO that pays its way. Europeans hoping that a Harris administration might return to the good old days where the US pays a lot and asks little in return will likely be disappointed.

Gordon has had an illustrious career as a think tanker and civil servant, including research positions in the UK and France. He holds a PhD from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies and wrote a dissertation entitled “A Certain Idea of France: French Security Policy and Gaullist Grand Strategy,” which examined French notions of sovereignty and global influence in relation to the US and NATO.

Before his current appointment, he served as the Director for European Affairs at the National Security Council under President Clinton, and as Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs during the Obama administration. He also has a long background in Middle East policy, and has held positions at both the Council on Foreign Relations and Brookings.

In July, Gordon said on X/Twitter that “US support for the Ukrainian people is enduring” and noted Russia’s aggression is “not only an attack on the lives and freedom of the people of Ukraine” but also “an attack on international rules and norms and principles embodied in UN Charter.”

Ivo Daalder, former US permanent representative to NATO under Obama who is now CEO of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, described Gordon as “totally prepared, a true expert on European and Middle East policy, and, importantly, Phil has been by the vice president’s side from the beginning.” 

Michael McFaul, former Ambassador to Russia, wrote on X last month that Harris has “a first-rate national security advisor” in Gordon, adding “he’s a real pro,” and on Substack wrote that except for maybe Biden, “no one in the entire Biden administration knows more about Europe than Gordon.”

Writing about Gordon and his cohort of Democratic national security experts, the journalist James Mann, said they “represented the generation of Democrats who learned how to run foreign policy during the 1990s. They were eager to show that the Democrats were not a bunch of pacifists, that they understood national security issues and were willing to use American force where necessary.”

While it has been suggested that Gordon might favor a harder line against Russia, Kurt Volker, Distinguished Fellow at CEPA and former US special representative for Ukraine negotiations, has said that’s unlikely.  

There are unknowns about the likely foreign policy of a Harris administration. Much has changed in recent years, not least Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine and the post-October 7 fighting in Israel and Gaza.

That said, there are clear indications of the direction Gordon might favor. During the Trump administration in 2019, he published a Foreign Affairs article titled “How Trump Killed the Atlantic Alliance: And How the Next President Can Restore It,” written alongside Jeremy Shapiro. The pair argued that Trump had uprooted the traditional NATO architecture, leaving room for a new, more transactional relationship to develop.

There was room for a more “realistic bargain between Europe and the United States, and one that better addresses the needs of both partners,” they wrote. There should be greater European strategic autonomy, and the piece pointedly stated that “no future US president will be elected on a mandate of solidarity with Europe without being assured of getting something in return.”

Gordon was among those foreign policy thinkers who had hoped for a better relationship with the Kremlin in the 2010s and before, but had “reluctantly” concluded that in the face of repeated Russian acts of aggression that the “United States needs to confront Russia more forcefully,” he wrote in a jointly authored 2018 piece.

The US is now doing just that. It’s very hard to imagine any change under a Harris administration.

Samuel Dempsey is the Director of Policy at European Horizons, a Security and Defence Officer at Young Professionals and Foreign Policy, an expert at Blue Europe, a research analyst at ITSS Verona, and an incoming Presidential Management Fellow at the US Department of State.