Elan Carr has been named as special envoy dedicated to fighting anti-Semitism, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced, as Politico reported.
President Donald Trump has been slow to fill many positions at the State Department, and this position has remained without an envoy for the first two years of this administration.
Significant bipartisan pressure from Congress had been placed on the administration to name an envoy.
Carr, who is a former criminal prosecutor and serves as a military officer, had been "an anti-terrorism expert, and a Jewish community leader" and "has played a prominent role in defending the safety of the Jewish people at home and abroad," Pompeo said in a statement Tuesday.
He ran for Congress as a Republican in California in 2014, but lost to Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif.
The State Department said that already this week Carr will attend conferences on combating anti-Semitism in Slovakia and Belgium.
The congressionally mandated position was established in 2004, according to The Jerusalem Post.
American Jewish Committee CEO David Harris said in a statement "We eagerly look forward to working with Carr, as his office combats rising anti-Semitism, generated from the far right, the far left, and Islamist extremists, and abetted by the ubiquitous nature of social media," JTA reported.
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