| Eugene Vindman was born in Soviet Ukraine to a Jewish family during the height of the Cold War. When he was three years old, his mother died of cancer and his father Seymon fled from the bigoted, authoritarian regime with Eugene, his twin brother Alex, their older brother Len, and their Grandmother.
Eugene's family arrived in New York City as refugees on Christmas Eve, 1979 with just $759 to their name, but with a deep faith in the American dream. His father Seymon got a job hauling furniture for $20 a day while he taught himself English. Eventually, he taught himself enough to pass an engineering exam for the city of New York to get a job as a "sandhog" building tunnels underneath the city as a member of AFSCME District Council 3.
Eugene, Alex, and Len attended public schools in Brooklyn, and after graduating from FDR High School Eugene attended SUNY Binghamton and enrolled in the Reserve Officers' Training Corps at Cornell as the next step in his years-long goal to join the Army and serve the country that had given him and his family so much.
It was also at Binghamton University where Eugene met his wife Cindy who was studying Biology, she ultimately became a Molecular Geneticist. After graduating from College, Eugene was commissioned as an infantry officer in the U.S. Army. He and Cindy began what would become a 25-year career in the Army.
Eugene spent the first half of his career in the Army as a Paratrooper and Infantry officer, then after putting himself through Law School once Cindy had finished her PHD and they were raising their son, Max, he became an officer in the JAG Corps. As a JAG Eugene served across the country and around the globe. As a JAG he served as a prosecutor where he fought to protect servicewomen from sexual predators and held serious felons accountable, as well as a battlefield advisor on the law of war to U.S. Forces-Iraq & General Lloyd Austin.
In 2016, Eugene was assigned to the Pentagon, and he and Cindy settled near family in Dale City, Virginia. Later, he joined the National Security Council (NSC) as a Legal Advisor focused on international partnerships, human rights, and ethics, and eventually became the NSC's Senior Ethics Official in the White House. |