David Ensor

Director, Voice of America

David Ensor was sworn in as the 28th Director of the Voice of America on June 16, 2011. He joined VOA after an extensive career in journalism and communications. Most recently he served as Director of Communications and Public Diplomacy at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan.

As Director of VOA, Ensor oversees a worldwide multimedia operation broadcasting in 43 languages, reaching an estimated 141 million people each week via radio, television, mobile, and the Internet.

From 1975 to 1980 Ensor reported for National Public Radio, where he covered the White House, foreign policy and defense issues. From 1980 to 1998, he was a television correspondent for ABC News, and from 1998 to 2006 he was CNN’s National Security Correspondent.

During this period, he reported on these major international stories: martial law and the re-emergence of Lech Walesa and Solidarity, from Warsaw; Middle Eastern terrorism and the travels of Pope John Paul II, from Rome; and the break-up of the Soviet Union, the end of Communism, two coup attempts and the first Chechen War, from Moscow. He has reported on armed conflicts in Bosnia, El Salvador, and Afghanistan, and traveled by Soviet tank from Jalalabad to Kabul as the Russians began their withdrawal from Afghanistan.

From 2006 through 2009, Ensor was Executive Vice President for Communications and Strategy at the Mercuria Energy Group, an international energy trading and investment group. He advised the company’s CEO and Board on strategic issues, and planned and executed a global communications strategy for the company.

He is a member of the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations and is fluent in French, with a basic knowledge of Polish, Russian and Italian.

Ensor received a B.A. with honors in European History from the University of California, Berkeley in 1974. He is married with two children.