By Sean Yoes
AFRO Staff Writer
D.C. attorney and campaign contributor Howard Gutman was among several donors that were awarded ambassadorships by President Obama. (Courtesy Photo)
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(June 13, 2009) - During his first 150 days in office Barack Obama has spent plenty of time overseas. But now, he’s dispatching several of the biggest financial donors from his presidential campaign around the globe to highly coveted, plum ambassadorships in Africa, Europe, the Mideast, Latin America and the Pacific.
This week Obama nominated high-powered D.C. attorney Howard Gutman to be the next U.S. envoy to Belgium, according to the White House. Gutman, named a “Washington, D.C. Super Lawyer” in 2007, 2008 and 2009, raised more than $500,000 for Obama’s campaign and personally gave him the maximum of $4,600.
The president named another D.C. lawyer, Mark Gitenstein to be ambassador to Romania. Gitenstein, a partner with the law firm Mayer-Brown personally contributed more than $19,000 to numerous campaigns during the 2008 election cycle, including Joe Biden, Mary Landrieu, John Conyers and Chris Dodd.
Obama also named Vinai Thummalapally—a long-time friend and a classmate of the president’s when they were at Occidental College in Los Angeles—U.S. ambassador to Belize. Thummalapally was a member of Obama’s National Finance Committee, the organization largely responsible for raising record-shattering amounts during the campaign, himself raised between $100,000 and $200,000 and personally donated $4,500.
Thummalapally attended Occidental with Obama from 1979 to 1980 before the future president transferred to Columbia University.
President Obama named former Virginia Lt. Gov. Donald Beyer ambassador to Switzerland and Luxembourg. Beyer, who is now a car dealer and businessman in Northern Virginia, was one of Obama’s earliest and most active advocates in the state, raising more than $500,000 for him.
Beyer, who served two terms as lieutenant governor beginning in 1989, lost the 1997 governor’s race to Republican Jim Gilmore.
This week the White House also announced Pamela Slutz as ambassador to Burundi, Richard Schmierer as ambassador to Oman and Gordon Gray as ambassador to Tunisia.