John Kerry / US special presidential envoy for climate
DC connection: The former presidential candidate was a military brat who spent part of his childhood in the District, attending Jackson Elementary and St. Albans.
Random fact: His family lived across the street from newspaper columnist Joe Alsop. Kerry was also a Cub Scout with Brit Hume.
Susan Rice / Head of the Domestic Policy Council
DC connection: Rice was born and raised in Washington. She graduated from Beauvoir and National Cathedral School.
Random fact: As a child of DC insiders, Rice grew up surrounded by prominent Washing-ton figures: Civil-rights activist Peggy Cooper Cafritz was her godmother, and Madeleine Albright is a family friend.
Elizabeth Wilkins / Senior adviser to chief of staff Ron Klain
DC connection: Wilkins, a Sidwell lifer, was born and raised in the District. Her late father was Pulitzer Prize–winning columnist and onetime Justice Department official Roger Wilkins.
Random fact: An attorney, she spent five years working for DC’s Office of the Attorney General and has clerked for both Elena Kagan and Merrick Garland.
Jeff Zients / Counselor to the President
DC connection: Raised in Kensington, Zients, who will head Biden’s Covid response, is a St. Albans grad.
Random fact: Previously a business exec and director of the National Economic Council, he once joined forces with Colin Powell, Atlantic Media owner David Bradley, and others in a failed attempt to buy the Washington Nationals.
Jane is a Chicago transplant who now calls Cleveland Park her home. Before joining Washingtonian, she wrote for Smithsonian Magazine and the Chicago Sun-Times. She is a graduate of Northwestern University, where she studied journalism and opera.
