Avril Haines, the U.S. director of national intelligence, and Amy McAuliffe, the assistant director of the CIA’s Weapons and Counterproliferation Mission Center, will be featured guests as part of the Notre Dame International Security Center’s Jack Kelly and Gail Weiss Lecture Series.

The discussion, titled “The U.S. Intelligence Community: Assessing Global Threats in Service to Country,” is a free but ticketed event open to the public. It will take place from 4 to 5:30 p.m. Friday (Sept. 16) in the Leighton Concert Hall at the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center. Tickets will be available for pick up one hour before the event at the DeBartolo box office.

Haines was sworn in as the director of national intelligence on Jan. 21, 2021. She is the seventh Senate-confirmed director of national intelligence in U.S. history and the first woman to lead the U.S. intelligence community. She joined the federal government as a civil servant and over the last two decades has worked in all three branches of government, in and outside of the intelligence community, and in academia as a research scholar at Columbia University and a senior fellow at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. Haines most recently led the transition’s National Security and Foreign Policy Team and served as a member of the National Commission on Military, National, and Public Service.

McAuliffe, a 1990 cum laude graduate of the University of Notre Dame, began serving as assistant director of the CIA’s Weapons and Counterproliferation Mission Center in October 2021. McAuliffe has held a variety of positions at CIA and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. She served as deputy assistant director of CIA for counterterrorism. Prior to that, she was chair of the National Intelligence Council from 2017 to 2019. She also holds a Master of Arts in international affairs from American University and a Master of Arts in military studies from the Marine Corps Command and Staff College. She is a recipient of a Presidential Rank Award — the highest award given to a civil servant — and the Langer Award, the most prestigious CIA award for analysts and leaders in the analytic field. She is also a recipient of the CIA Director’s Award. 

To ensure the safety of patrons and employees, there will be a bag policy in effect for this event. Prohibited items include, but are not limited to, purses larger than a clutch bag, briefcases, backpacks, computer bags, camera bags, diaper bags, plastic grocery store bags and other large bags.

The Jack Kelly and Gail Weiss Lecture Series in National Security brings senior figures in the international security field — including policy experts, members of nongovernmental organizations, academics, journalists, military leaders, government officials and others — to speak at Notre Dame. Past lecturers include U.S. Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; U.S. Army Gen. Keith Alexander, former director of the National Security Agency; 9/11 Commission co-chair and former Rep. Lee Hamilton; and retired Gen. Jack Keane, former U.S. Army vice chief of staff.