William R. Stewart

Deputy Chief of Mission William "Bill" Stewart.

William R. “Bill” Stewart is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service with the personal rank of Counselor, roughly equivalent to a one-star general officer in the U.S. military. He is currently the Deputy Chief of Mission at the American Embassy in Stockholm, Sweden. Prior to his current assignment, Bill was a Visiting Professor and the Diplomat in Residence at The University of Texas at Austin where he taught a graduate course on U.S. Diplomacy.

Before his tour as Diplomat in Residence, Bill served for three years as Minister Counselor for Economic and Political Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, Egypt from August 2006 to July 2009. As Minister Counselor, Bill was the senior economic and political advisor to the Ambassador, and a member of her core Country Team. The U.S. Embassy in Cairo is one of the largest and most important American diplomatic missions in the world, with nearly 1500 employees supporting a multitude of U.S. foreign policy objectives. Bill led a team of twenty political and economic officers and a dozen Egyptian experts whose portfolios included bilateral political and economic relations, internal political and economic issues, and regional concerns, including the Middle East Peace Process.

Prior to his Cairo assignment, Bill served as Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Muscat, Oman from January 2004 to June 2006.  From June 2003 to December 2003, Bill served in Iraq under the auspices of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), first as a political advisor to the Regional Coordinator for CPA-North, and then as Governorate Coordinator for Salah ad Din Governorate, based in Tikrit, for which he received the Secretary of Defense Exceptional Civilian Service Award. Previously, he served as Chief of the Political-Economic Section at the U.S. Embassy in Muscat from June 2000 to June 2003.

Bill joined the Foreign Service in 1984 and has served in nine overseas assignments, including Stockholm, Muscat, Montreal, Sana'a, and Dubai. He was a John L. Weinberg fellow at Princeton University for the 1999-2000 academic year, earning a Master's Degree in Public Policy.  He speaks Arabic and Swedish.  Bill is married to the former Diane Polis, and they have six wonderful children scattered across the globe from Morocco to Michigan.