Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton announced today that Todd Stern ’77, a former White House assistant who was the senior U.S. negotiator at the Kyoto climate talks, will be the special envoy for climate change. Stern will serve as the chief U.S. negotiator at U.N. talks on climate change, as well as with individual nations and groups.

Most recently, Stern was a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, where he focused on climate change and environmental issues. He was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a partner at WilmerHale.

In the Clinton White House, from 1993 to 1999, Stern served as assistant to the president and staff secretary. He coordinated the Clinton administration’s Initiative on Global Climate Change, acting as the senior White House negotiator at the Kyoto and Buenos Aires climate talks. At the U.S. Department of the Treasury, from 1999 to 2001, Stern was an adviser to the secretary on a broad range of issues and supervised the Treasury’s anti-money laundering strategy.

Stern also served as an adviser to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, offering counsel on issues pertaining to the environment and global warming.