Karl Stoltz

KARL STOLTZ is Foreign Policy Advisor for Deft9 Solutions (www.deft9.com) and Co-President of the Public Diplomacy Council of America (PDCA).

Karl retired from the U.S. State Department in October 2024 after 38 ½ years as a diplomat, most recently as Senior Advisor and acting Deputy Coordinator in the Global Engagement Center (GEC), which focused on countering foreign information manipulation and interference from America’s adversaries.

Karl also served as Minister-Counselor for Public Affairs in Russia and South Africa, as Deputy Chief of Mission in Denmark and Myanmar, as an Office Director in the East Asia/Pacific Bureau and the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, and as a public diplomacy officer in Malaysia, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, New Zealand, and the former Soviet Union.

Karl taught as Public Diplomacy Fellow at GWU for 2017-2018. He studied as an undergraduate at the University of Virginia, and as a graduate student at Middlebury University and the Foreign Service Institute. Karl’s foreign languages include Indonesian, Malaysian, Russian, PNG Pidgin, and some Danish and Polish. His hobbies are traveling (naturally), trivia quizzes and other forms of gaming, and the Hash House Harriers running club.