Ep. 3 – WITA’s Friday Exchange: Japan, Indonesia, and India Updates – Building Momentum towards the August 1st Deadline

Wendy Cutler is Senior Vice President at the Asia Society Policy Institute (ASPI), based in Washington, D.C. In this role, she focuses on leading initiatives that address challenges related to trade, investment, economic security, and innovation, as well as women’s empowerment in Asia.

Cutler joined ASPI following an illustrious career of nearly three decades as a diplomat and negotiator in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), where she also served as Acting Deputy U.S. Trade Representative. During her time at USTR, she worked on a range of bilateral, regional, and multilateral trade negotiations and initiatives, including the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, U.S.-China negotiations, and the WTO Financial Services negotiations.

Cutler has published a series of ASPI papers on the Asian trade landscape and serves as a regular media commentator on trade and investment developments in Asia and the world.

Mark Linscott is a Senior Advisor with the US India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF), leading efforts to advance US-India trade. He also serves as a Senior Advisor at The Asia Group and a Nonresident Senior Fellow with the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center.

Previously, Linscott was Assistant U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) for South and Central Asian Affairs from December 2016 to December 2018, serving as the U.S. government lead in developing trade policy with countries across South and Central Asia. He led efforts in the bilateral Trade Policy Forum with India and in Trade and Investment Framework Agreements (TIFAs) with Central Asia, Bangladesh, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.

From 2012 to 2016, Linscott served as Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for World Trade Organization (WTO) and Multilateral Affairs, coordinating U.S. trade policies in the WTO. He and his team led negotiations in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) on customs matters, government procurement, subsidies and trade remedies, and technical barriers to trade, and he represented the United States in trade meetings of the G-20 and the OECD.

Linscott was Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Environment and Natural Resources from October 2003 to March 2012, overseeing all trade and environment issues for USTR, including in free trade agreement negotiations such as the TPP and in the WTO and OECD. During this period, he developed a robust agenda on illegal logging and associated trade through Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and bilateral agreements with Indonesia and China.

From 1996 to 2002, Linscott represented the United States at the U.S. Mission to the WTO in Geneva and was a founding member of the WTO Pension Fund Management Board. Prior to Geneva, he worked in the Office of WTO and Multilateral Affairs at USTR in Washington, where he concluded the Uruguay Round Government Procurement Agreement as the lead U.S. negotiator.

Linscott began his career at the Department of Commerce, serving from 1985 to 1988 in Import Administration and from 1988 to 1992 in the Office of Multilateral Affairs. He was awarded a Gold Medal Award, the Commerce Department’s highest honor, for his work on the 1986 Canadian softwood lumber investigation.

Linscott holds a BA in economics from the University of Virginia and a JD from Georgetown University Law Center. He and his wife, Karen, live in Washington, DC, where he tinkers on his café racer motorcycles and paddles on the Potomac.

Kate Kalutkiewicz, Senior Managing Director, leads the McLarty trade practice and contributes to the firm’s Europe practice and McLarty Inbound.Kate has managed complex challenges around global trade, industrial, and investment policy for over two decades. Her experience spans roles in government, particularly in Europe and South America, where she honed her skills in negotiating complex international agreements and navigating the nuance around public-private sector interactions.

Kate most recently served as Head of US Trade Policy for Amazon, where she advocated a broad range of international trade and economic issues with the US Government, touching several sectors, including retail, creative content production and distribution, cloud services, sustainable fleet, autos, and hardline manufacturing.

Prior to that, Kate served as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for International Trade at the National Economic Council, where she developed and led US trade policy initiatives. During her White House tenure, she led interagency teams responsible for the US G7 Presidency and US positions on supply chain resiliency and support for the economy during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Before serving in the White House, Kate was the Senior Trade Representative at the US Mission to the European Union from 2016-2020. While in Brussels, she was the USTR’s primary interlocutor with the European Commission and Member State authorities responsible for trade.

Before her time in Brussels, Kate held the role of USTR’s Director for European Affairs (2011-2016) and served as Associate Chief Negotiator for the US in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations. She began her career at USTR as its Director for Brazil and the Southern Cone (2007-2011), where she was the principal agency representative for implementing and managing US trade policy in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, and Paraguay.

Prior to USTR, Kate was a legislative assistant in the office of Senator James Talent (R-MO), where she supported the Senator on issues related to trade, foreign policy, homeland security, immigration, and the judiciary.

Joe Damond’s career spans more than 40 years in both the government and private sectors in Washington. He served 16 years as a trade official at the Department of Commerce and the Office of the United States Trade Representative, holding a diverse set of responsibilities across that time.

Most notably, Damond spent seven years as Deputy Assistant United States Trade Representative for Asia and the Pacific, where he was responsible for executing U.S. trade policy with Southeast Asia and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. He served as chief negotiator of bilateral trade agreements with Laos and Cambodia, as well as the historic Bilateral Trade Agreement with Vietnam, concluded in 2000, and also chaired the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Committee on Trade and Investment.

Damond then spent more than 20 years in the private sector, holding senior positions in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries focused on international trade, health policy, and global government affairs, representing the sector during numerous bilateral and global trade agreements. For the past four years, he has worked as a consultant on healthcare and trade policy issues, representing both private sector and government clients with a focus on Asia and Europe.

Damond is the author of Give Trade a Chance: The Negotiation of the U.S.-Vietnam Bilateral Trade Agreement.