Alexander Semyon Vindman (Ukrainian: Олекса́ндр Семенович Ві́ндман; born June 6, 1975) is a retired United States Army lieutenant colonel who was the Director for European Affairs for the United States National Security Council (NSC) until he was reassigned on February 7, 2020.
Vindman is currently director for the think tank the Institute for Informed American Leadership (IIAL).
1979
After the death of their mother, the three-year-old twins and their older brother, Leonid, were brought to New York in December 1979 by their father, Semyon (Simon).
They grew up in Brooklyn's Brighton Beach neighborhood.
The twins appear briefly with their maternal grandmother in the Ken Burns documentary The Statue of Liberty.
Vindman speaks fluent Russian and Ukrainian.
1991
Vindman's doctoral dissertation focused on U.S. Foreign Policy toward Ukraine from 1991 to 2004.
1993
He graduated in 1993 from Franklin Delano Roosevelt High School.
1999
Commissioned in 1999 as an infantry officer, Vindman received a Purple Heart medal for wounds he received from an IED attack in the Iraq War in 2004.
In 1999, Vindman graduated from the State University of New York at Binghamton with a bachelor of arts degree in history.
He took part in the Reserve Officers' Training Corps while in college and received a second lieutenant's commission in the Army's Infantry Branch in January 1999.
He later received a master of arts degree from Harvard University in Russian, Eastern European and Central Asian studies.
Vindman completed the Infantry Officer Basic Course (IOBC) at Fort Benning in 1999 and was sent the next year to South Korea, where he led both infantry and anti-armor platoons.
2004
In addition to overseas assignments to South Korea and Germany, Vindman is a combat veteran of the Iraq War, and he served in Iraq from September 2004 to September 2005.
In October 2004, he sustained an injury from a roadside bomb in Iraq, for which he received a Purple Heart.
2008
Vindman became a foreign area officer specializing in Eurasia in 2008, and assumed the position of Director for European Affairs with the NSC in 2018.
He was promoted to the rank of major in 2008, and to lieutenant colonel in September 2015.
During his Army career, Vindman earned the Ranger Tab, Combat Infantryman Badge, Expert Infantryman Badge, and Parachutist Badge, as well as four Army Commendation Medals and two Defense Meritorious Service Medals.
Beginning in 2008, Vindman became a Foreign Area Officer specializing in Eurasia.
In this capacity he served in the U.S. embassies in Kyiv, Ukraine, and Moscow, Russia.
Returning to Washington, D.C. he was then a politico-military affairs officer focused on Russia for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
2015
Vindman was on the Joint Staff at the Pentagon from September 2015 to July 2018.
2018
In July 2018, Vindman accepted an assignment with the National Security Council.
In his role on the NSC, Vindman became part of the U.S. delegation at the inauguration of Ukraine's newly elected President, Volodymyr Zelensky.
The five-member delegation, led by Rick Perry, United States Secretary of Energy, also included Kurt Volker, then U.S. Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations; Gordon Sondland, United States Ambassador to the European Union; and Joseph Pennington, then acting chargé d'affaires.
2019
Vindman came to national attention in October 2019 when he testified before the United States Congress regarding the Trump–Ukraine scandal.
His testimony provided evidence that resulted in a charge of abuse of power in the First impeachment of Donald Trump.
Vindman was subpoenaed to testify before Congressional investigators on October 29, 2019, as part of the U.S. House of Representatives' impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump.
He is the first White House official to testify who was actually on a July 25, 2019, telephone call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in which Trump asked Zelensky to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden, while his father was campaigning for President.
Based on his opening statement, obtained in advance by The New York Times, Vindman's testimony corroborates previous testimony from Fiona Hill, his former manager, and William B. Taylor Jr., acting Ambassador to Ukraine.
2020
In July 2020, Vindman retired after 21 years in the military.
He cited vengeful behavior and bullying by President Trump and administration officials after he complied with a subpoena to testify in front of Congress during Trump's impeachment hearings.
At the time of his retirement, Vindman's promotion to the rank of colonel had been abnormally stalled by the administration.
In February 2022, he unsuccessfully sued several Trump allies, alleging that they had intimidated and retaliated against him while he testified in Congress.
Alexander Semyon Vindman (né Aleksandr Semyonovich Vindman) and his identical twin brother Yevgeny were born in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, Soviet Union to a Jewish family.
After departing from the National Security Council in 2020, Alexander Vindman resumed his studies.
Between 2020 and 2022, he pursued doctoral studies at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies and continues to be a senior fellow for the Foreign Policy Institute at the same institution.
In the same year, 2020, he was appointed the inaugural Pritzker Military Fellow at the Lawfare Institute.
This fellowship supported Col. Vindman's research, writing, and public discourse on subjects including national security, defense, civil-military relations, and public service for two years.
Starting in 2023, Col. Vindman took on roles as a Hauser Leader and Senior Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Center for Public Leadership.
