2024 September Speaker Beth Sanner

Beth Sanner
Former Presidential Intelligence Briefer, Former Deputy Director of National Intelligence

During her career spanning more than three decades as a leader in the Intelligence Community working in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, CIA, U.S. Department of State, and White House, Beth Sanner was a trusted adviser to multiple U.S. presidents, congressional and cabinet officials, and foreign partners on our nation’s most important intelligence and national security matters. As the senior-most analyst for the entire Intelligence Community (IC), she uncovered threats to our country, and, as the Office of the Director of National Intelligence’s director of the President’s Daily Brief and Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Mission Integration, briefed our presidents on their potential impact. Having served in several leadership, staff, policy, and analytic positions in the IC, Sanner was among the most influential voices in presidential decision-making on national and global affairs. Her acumen is highly sought after by our nation’s leaders and organizations across various industries.

Exclusively represented by Leading Authorities, Sanner uniquely immerses audiences in her talks —making them feel as though they are our nation’s leaders being briefed on hot-button developments with the potential to reshape our world. Drawing from more than 35 years leading at the highest levels of intelligence, she provides a high-level overview of what’s at play in the current threat landscape, nationally and globally — analyzing complex geopolitical factors, proposing the best path toward the most beneficial outcome, and offering her predictions for how events will unfold. She neatly blends key analytics with compelling visual storytelling to share important insights in a way that is easily digestible for audiences. 

Regarded as an innovator, change agent, and leadership expert in intelligence circles, she oversaw the elements that coordinate and lead collection, analysis, and program oversight throughout the Intelligence Community (IC) during her two years as the Deputy Director of National Intelligence. Throughout her six-year tenure at the ODNI, a senior-level agency that provides oversight to the Intelligence Community, she also briefed the president and his advisers several times weekly, managed the IC’s most influential analytic enterprises (the President’s Daily Brief and the National Intelligence Council), led the IC’s integration of core mission areas across 18 agencies and tens of thousands of employees, and drove organization-wide initiatives on innovative programs and technology adoption. Before the ODNI, Sanner spent more than a decade as a senior executive in the CIA’s Directorate of Analysis, the branch responsible for the production and distribution of analysis on key foreign issues. In this role, she led analytical components that informed U.S. policy and strategy on South Asia, Russia, and Europe. Previously, she was the U.S. Department of State’s special adviser for Balkan Affairs and a director in the National Security Council’s Russian and European Directorate at the White House, a role in which she briefed Presidents HW Bush and Clinton and their vice presidents and national security advisers and led the coordination of the president’s policy on Russia and Eastern Europe. 

Sanner is currently the principal at Insight Consulting, where she adapts her leadership and innovation expertise to provide organizations with tangible strategies for accomplishing their objectives. In addition to Insight Consulting, Sanner is a senior adviser at International Capital Strategies, a senior fellow at Harvard’s Belfer Center, a visiting professor of practice at the University of Maryland’s Applied Research Lab for Intelligence and Security, and a contributing expert to The Cipher Brief. She also appears as a national security contributor on CNN, providing analysis on today’s top intelligence and geopolitical matters.  

Widely recognized for her influence on national intelligence strategy and policy, Sanner is the recipient of the Presidential Rank Award (the highest honor bestowed on civil servants, awarded by President Biden), Distinguished Intelligence Service Medal, Distinguished Career Intelligence Medal, two Superior Intelligence Service Medals, multiple CIA and DNI Director’s Awards, and several other accolades. She is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Sanner earned her B.A. in economics and international affairs from American University and was a Distinguished Graduate of the National War College, earning an M.S. in national security strategy.