Millersville, Maryland, United States
Tom Melia brings more than three decades of foreign policy & program management experience in Washington -- U.S. Senate staff, senior official at State Dept and USAID, leader of major international NGOs, visiting professor at three major universities -- to his recent work as Deputy Staff Director of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Melia has published widely on foreign policy, democracy & human rights.
While researching possible ways that the United States may re-emerge as a leading supporter of democratic progress globally, I mentor graduate students in Georgetown's Masters in Democracy & Governance program.
For the Masters program in Democracy & Governance, I teach a class about the importance of professional journalism as a bulwark of democracy, and the attacks on fact-based reporting by autocratic governments and their allies.
Advised graduate students in the Heinz College Washington campus on the development of a methodology to implement the Combatting Global Corruption Act, proposed by Senator Ben Cardin, and enacted in 2023.
Advised Senator Cardin on a global range of policy issues, with a focus on advancing human rights and anti-corruption initiatives, the defense of Ukraine, public international broadcasting and conflict in the Middle East.