Takeaways Podcast – S2:E25 – Special Envoy Elan Carr

https://soundcloud.com/user-453317975/episode-25-elan-carr

I am blessed to be around remarkable people. There are always Takeaways to learn. That is what I am sharing on this podcast.

Takeaways – Life. Lessons. Learned. explores learning from the wisdom of others.

This was a landmark episode for Takeaways! We recorded in front of a live audience, we recorded on video (currently in editing) and we had to get official approval from the U.S. State Department to sit down with our guest!!

February 5, 2019 Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, appointed Elan S. Carr to be Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat anit-Semitism. This position was established in 2004 as part of the Office of Religion and Global Affairs at the United States Department of State.

Rewind to the summer of 1999. I was a rising sophomore attending UNLV. My fraternity brothers put me forward to receive a full scholarship to attend the Alpha Epsilon Pi International Convention in Morristown, New Jersey. At one of the leadership breakout sessions was this guy with radiating enthusiasm. Whenever he saw someone he knew, he would let out this signature “dooooooooode” as the pitch in his voice raised, his arms would open wide in anticipation of a brotherly embrace. He would then say in perfect Hebrew, “brother how I missed you!”

Elan was already a legend to droves of Alpha Epsilon Pi brothers around the world back then as a major volunteer. He joined AEPi as an undergraduate at U.C. Berkeley where he earned a degree in Philosophy and Political Science. Then he went to Northwestern University to get his law degree. Operation Desert Storm occurred when he was a first year law student. That compelled Elan to join the U.S. Army. It was that decision which lead him to serve in the Iraqi War after the events of 9/11. The stories Elan shares in this episode about his experiences in Iraq are almost unbelievable.

Elan’s day job for 13 years was as a criminal prosecutor in Los Angeles Country. He focused both as a gang prosecutor and in the Special Victims Unit prosecuting child molesters, rapists, and domestic abusers. In 2014 Elan ran for Congress and lost. It was that election, however, that put him on the radar of the National Republican Party to be considered almost 5 years later for this current role.

Politics aside what else can you learn from a person like Special Envoy Carr? Here are just a few of the Takeaways that we discussed on this episode.