Brussels Forum Session: Trade Wars and a New American Economic Order: Implications for Europe and the World & Rebalancing Power, Restoring Trust: The GMF Transatlantic Taskforce Report

Michał Baranowski has served as undersecretary of state in Poland’s Ministry of Economic Development and Technology since December 2024. He is a political scientist and author of numerous publications on transatlantic relations, European policies, and the European security order.  

Baranowski began his career as an analyst in GMF’s Brussels office and served the organization in various capacities, focusing on transatlantic cooperation, particularly with Central Europe and the Eastern Partnership countries. Between 2008 and 2011, he worked at GMF’s headquarters in Washington, DC, where he led a project on transatlantic trade. In 2011, he established GMF’s Warsaw office, the city’s first permanent office of a Western think tank. Ten years later, he became managing director of GMF East, overseeing the organization’s work in Poland, Ukraine, the Baltic States, the Visegrád Group, and Romania. His team produced a report on a “Marshall Plan” for Ukraine.

Baranowski is a frequent contributor to Polish and international media, offering analysis of economic and international affairs. He studied economics and political science at Mercer University in the United States, the University of Oxford, and Maastricht University. He holds a master’s degree in European public affairs from Maastricht University.

Brussels Forum Session: Preview: A Window Into the NATO Summit

Matthew G. Whitaker has been permanent representative of the United States to NATO since April 2025. He previously served as acting attorney general of the United States from 2018 to 2019, following his tenure as chief of staff to Attorney General Jeff Sessions. He was US attorney for the Southern District of Iowa from 2004 to 2009.

In private practice, Whitaker was the managing partner of Whitaker Hagenow & Gustoff, LLP, a Des Moines-based law firm, from 2009 until he rejoined the US Department of Justice in 2017. He has served as a senior fellow at the American Cornerstone Institute, co-chair of the Center for Law and Justice at the America First Policy Institute, and a senior fellow at the American Conservative Union Foundation, and was of counsel with Graves Garrett Greim, a law firm.

Whitaker holds an MBA, law degree, and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Iowa. During his time there, he was a three-year letterman on the football team and played in the 1991 Rose Bowl.

Maroš Šefčovič is a Slovak diplomat who since December 2024 has served as European commissioner for trade and economic security; interinstitutional relations and transparency. He leads the Commission’s work on designing and implementing a free and fair trade policy, and is tasked with establishing an effective and modern customs system.

Šefčovič was appointed vice-president of the European Commission in charge of interinstitutional relations and foresight in 2019, before assuming responsibility for overseeing the European Green Deal as executive vice-president in 2023. He was elected to the European Parliament in 2014, while serving from 2010 to 2019 as vice-president of the European Commission in charge first of interinstitutional relations and administration, and then the energy union.

Šefčovič first served as a European Commissioner from 2009 to 2010, when he was responsible for education, training, culture, and youth. Before that, from 2004 to 2009, he was the permanent representative of the Slovak Republic to the EU, contributing to the country's major integration projects, such as its entry into the eurozone and the Schengen area. A diplomat by profession, he served between 1992 and 2004 in Zimbabwe and Canada, and as ambassador to Israel.

Šefčovič holds a law degree and a PhD in European Law from Comenius University in Bratislava. He is also a graduate of the University of Economy in Bratislava and the Moscow State Institute for Foreign Relations. He undertook training in diplomacy at Stanford University in the United States. He is the author of “Driving the EU Forward – Straight Talks with Maroš Šefčovič”, which focuses on his first mandate as the Commission vice-president.

Brussels Forum Session: Transatlantic Defense: Who Pays? Who Acts?

Maria Malmer Stenergard has been the foreign affairs minister of Sweden since September 2024 and a board member of the Moderate Party since 2021. She previously served as minister for migration and chair of the Parliamentary Committee on Social Insurance. She was a member of the Swedish parliament, the Riksdag, for eight years.

Stenergard holds a law degree and a bachelor’s degree in information systems from Lund University. 

Brussels Forum Session: What Does the Future Hold for American Democracy? 

Kristen Soltis Anderson is a pollster, speaker, commentator, and author of “The Selfie Vote: Where Millennials Are Leading America (And How Republicans Can Keep Up)”. She is a founding partner of Echelon Insights, an opinion research and analytics firm that serves brands, trade associations, nonprofits, and political clients. Through her work at Echelon, she advises corporate and government leaders on polling and messaging strategy, and has become one of the foremost experts on the Millennial generation. She also leads focus groups for The New York Times opinion section’s “America in Focus” series, is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times, and is an on-air contributor for CNN. She has appeared on programs such as The Daily Show, Meet The Press, and HBO’s Real Time With Bill Maher. She writes the Codebook newsletter on Substack.  

In 2016, Soltis Anderson was named one of ELLE’s “Most Compelling Women in Washington”. Three years earlier she was named one of TIME’s “30 Under 30 Changing the World”. She has served as a fellow at Harvard University’s Institute of Politics and Georgetown University’s Institute of Politics and Public Service. She holds a master’s degree in government from Johns Hopkins University and a bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Florida.

Brussels Forum Session: A New Global Order—Part I

Kaja Kallas is the current High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission. She was prime minister of Estonia from January 2021 until July 2024. She became the leader of Estonia’s Reform Party in 2018, and was twice a member of the Estonian parliament (2011– 2014 and 2019–2021). From 2014 to 2018, Kallas served as a member of the European Parliament (Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe), where her primary focus was on the Digital Single Market strategy, energy, and consumer policies. Before entering politics, Kallas was a  partner in two law firms and specialized in European and Estonian competition law. She is a graduate of Tartu University law school. Kallas is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise of Ukraine, the Grand Cross of the Order of the Star of Romania, and the CEPA Transatlantic Leadership Award.

Brussels Forum Session: The End of Dollar Dominance?

Jacob Funk Kirkegaard is a senior fellow at Bruegel and a nonresident senior fellow with the Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE). He was a Brussels-based senior fellow at GMF from 2020 to 2024. For seven years prior to that, he was a Washington, DC-based senior fellow at PIIE. He has also worked with the Danish defense ministry and the United Nations in Iraq, and in the financial sector.  

Kirkegaard is a graduate of the Danish Army's Special School of Intelligence and Linguistics with the rank of first lieutenant, the University of Aarhus, and Columbia University. He received his PhD from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. He is co-editor of “Transatlantic Economic Challenges in an Era of Growing Multipolarity”, author of “The Accelerating Decline in America's High-Skilled Workforce: Implications for Immigration Policy”, and co-author of “US Pension Reform: Lessons from Other Countries” and “Transforming the European Economy”. He assisted with “Accelerating the Globalization of America: The Role for Information Technology”. His current research focuses on European economies and reform, transatlantic economic transition, immigration, labor markets, foreign direct investment trends and estimations, the global demographic transformation, and the impact of information technology. 

US Senator Heidi Heitkamp served as the first female senator elected from North Dakota between 2013 and 2019. While in the Senate, she prioritized improving the lives of Indigenous people and working families, stopping human trafficking, guaranteeing affordable health care, addressing childhood trauma, eliminating unnecessary regulation, and securing an energy policy that kept costs low but achieved climate goals. She was previously North Dakota’s attorney general and tax commissioner.

Heitkamp serves on numerous boards including those of The McCain Institute, The Howard Buffett Foundation, the Restore Democracy Initiative, and GMF. She is the founder and chair of the One Country Project, an organization focused on addressing the needs and concerns of rural America, and director of the Institute of Politics at the University of Chicago. She is also a contributor to CNBC and ABC News. 

Brussels Forum Session: Defense as a Driver of Innovation: Ideas from GMF Transatlantic Taskforce Members and Friends 

Gabrielius Landsbergis was foreign minister of Lithuania from 2020 to 2024, during which time he also held the position of president of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe. He ensured while in office that Lithuania became known globally as a standard-bearer in the fight for freedom and rule of law by providing significant support to Ukraine and by supporting initiatives to secure freedom in Georgia, Moldova, Taiwan, and elsewhere.

Prior to and concurrent with his service as foreign minister, Landsbergis served two terms in the Lithuanian parliament, the Seimas. He is also a former member of the European Parliament and the former chairman of his center-right party, the Homeland Union.  

Since leaving politics and diplomacy in 2024, Landsbergis has been working on publishing his diaries. They are due to be released in 2025.