Talk:Michelle Kwan

Several editors are modifying this article to claim Kwan as a diplomat based on Biden's announcement of his intent to nominate her as ambassador to Belize. There are a few things to keep in mind here, though.

She's not ambassador until Senate confirmation and swearing. I expect that some of the editors here are coming from the figure-skating side of her career and may not be up on the requirements to become an ambassador, but the person must first be nominated; then the nomination must be confirmed in the US Senate; and then, finally, she must take the oath of office. Until all three of those are done, she does not have the position.

First, she has not yet been nominated. The announcement is of Biden's intent to nominate her. He still needs to make the nomination formal, i.e., put it in writing and formally transmit that to the Senate. There have been cases in the past where the intent to make a particular nomination has been announced, but the nomination actually never happens. And in any case it can be weeks or months between the announcement of the intent to nominate and the formal nomination itself.

This is accurately reflected in the article as I type this:

On December 15, 2021, President Joe Biden announced that he intended to nominate Kwan to be United States Ambassador to Belize.^[1]

More to the point, as of now, the following statement, and others like it, that have been added to the article is false:

In December 2021, President Joe Biden nominated Kwan to serve as the United States Ambassador to Belize.

Biden has not yet nominated her; he has announced his intent to nominate her.

Second, unless and until the Senate confirms her, she cannot take the position. This normally takes a month or two.

Finally, once the Senate confirms her, she must be sworn into the office. This is usually (but not always) a short time after confirmation; often on the same day. Still, it's not official until sworn. Unlikely as it would be, it's possible for a nominee to be confirmed, and then despite that not take the job (though I don't know of any such cases offhand, at least other than in the early days of the republic).

For comparison, consider the nomination of Michelle K. Lee to be head of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Obama announced his intent to nominate her on October 17, 2014. He did not actually nominate her until November 11, more than three weeks later. Her confirmation did not come about until March 9, three months after that. In fact, because of a change in Congress (which is not going to happen at the end of an odd-numbered year like 2021), Obama had to re-nominate her, but even accounting for that, there was a six-week gap between that renomination and her confirmation. Finally, Lee did not take the office for another week: she was sworn in on February 12.

So please, let's not jump the gun here. Do not edit the article to say Kwan has been nominated until she has been nominated. Do not edit the article to say she has taken office until she has taken office. It's certainly worthwhile to mention some of the intermediate steps: her appearance at her confirmation hearing; a vote and recommendation for confirmation by the Senate Committee of Foreign Relations; and of course, any confirmation by the Senate herself. But let's not put her down for being nominated until she's nominated; or for having the job before she has the job. TJRC (talk) 20:52, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

I agree that it is too early to describe Kwan as a "diplomat" in the lede, but describing her nomination as "potential" after it was announced on Whitehouse.gov seems odd to me. KidAd • SPEAK 19:17, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Except the point above is that her nomination has not been announced; only the intent to nominate, so it is still only potential (or maybe "likely"?) at this point. "Today, President Joe Biden announced his intent to nominate the following individuals..." TJRC (talk) 19:20, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Update: Kwan was officially nominated on January 7; I've updated the article accordingly.

The cautions about updating the article to say she actually is ambassador continue to apply: the steps still remaining are: the Committee on Foreign Relations needs to hold its hearings; the Committee needs to vote to advance it to consideration of the full Senate; the Senate needs to vote to confirm; and then finally, Kwan has to be sworn in. All of these need to happen before we can say she is the Ambassador. As she advances through each of these steps, the advancement can be noted, but let's continue to refrain from saying she is ambassador until she actually is. TJRC (talk) 20:24, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

Two more down, two to go.

• "actually nominated": as noted above, done (Jan. 7)
• "the Committee on Foreign Relations needs to hold its hearings": Done (May 18)
• "the Committee needs to vote to advance it to consideration of the full Senate": Done (June 9)
• "the Senate needs to vote to confirm": still pending; it's on the Senate Executive Calendar, item no. 981 Done (September 29).
• "Kwan has to be sworn in": presumably shortly after confirmation.

TJRC (talk) 21:10, 10 June 2022 (UTC)

OrangeLTE has added her Senate confirmation with source. (Thanks!). Now all that's needed is her being sworn, and we can document her as having the position.

(By the way, style points for CNN for its phrasing that "Kwan... skated through the chamber’s confirmation process with a voice vote," and kudos to OrangeLTE for their restraint declining to replicate the pun.) TJRC (talk) 22:10, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

Update (Dec. 2, 2022). Surprisingly, it's been a little more than two months, and there's still no indication that Kwan has taken the position. I'm not sure why this would be (except maybe the logistics of pulling up stakes and physically moving to Belize, maybe).

• There have been no news stories (that I can find) showing Kwan having taken office.
• There is no announcement on the State department saying she's taken office.
• There is a transcript of a relatively informal talk given by State Deputy Secretary Wendy R. Sherman at a "Reception for the Diplomatic Corps in Honor of the World Cup" on Nov. 21, where she referred to "...Olympic champions like Michelle Kwan, who once served as a public diplomacy representative at the State Department and now serves as our ambassador to Belize." But that's a little too tangent to serve as a WP:RS for Kwan having actually taken office.
• On the State Department's Belize mission website, the "Key Officers" page continues to list the ambassador position as "vacant" and Chargé d’Affaires, Leyla Moses-Ones as the person in charge in the absence of an ambassador.
• The Belize mission's "Ambassador" page, which until recently previously listed Moses-Ones in lieu of an ambassador now generates a 404-Not Found error.
• The Belize mission's "our relationship" page also continues to list Moses-Ones as the person in charge, with no mention of Kwan.

I think what we need to reliably report that Kwan has taken office we need either a news report showing she's taken office; some release or similar from the State Department saying she's taken the office; or an update to something on bz.usembassy.gov showing Kwan as ambassador (even if no actual announcement is made). TJRC (talk) 00:02, 3 December 2022 (UTC)

One day later, it's now official: Kwan is now listed on the State department's "our ambassador" Belize page as ambassador.

A couple other things I was able to find:

• She received her official appointment following her September 9 confirmation on October 7;^[2]
• She was sworn in (i.e., officially took office) on October 10.^[3]

I'll make these updates in the next few days if no one beats me to it. TJRC (talk) 21:17, 4 December 2022 (UTC)

She was on an episode of season 4 of Queer Eye (a netflix Show), where she cameoed. Thought it might be worth a mention. — Insertcleverphrasehere^{(or here)_{(or here)(or here)}} 21:53, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

Would you find a source for that? Thanks. Sundayclose (talk) 22:56, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

Why isn't information about her being ambassador on her infobox? Normally if she were a nominee, that'd still be listed on the infobox. Now that she's been confirmed, I think it's a little overdue to add her ambassadorship to her infobox. 38.106.246.199 (talk) 19:24, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

Because she's not ambassador, at least not yet. See #Nomination as ambassador to Belize, above. TLDR: she's been nominated and confirmed; once she's sworn, she's ambassador, and that has not yet happened; as of the time I write this, the U.S. State Department's Belize page still shows the ambassadorship as "vacant" and Leyla Moses-Ones as running the show as Chargé d'affaires; that will change if/when Kwan takes the oath of office and actually becomes ambassador. (I say "if/when" only out of an abundance of caution; I see no reason to think she won't be sworn.) TJRC (talk) 00:25, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Could somebody find more background sources than to constantly quote from Ellyn Kestnbaum who is an author of a book on figure skating and not really a very qualified or experienced source. I felt like this article has a sort of one opinion bias to it. ~2026-12256-62 (talk) 09:38, 24 February 2026 (UTC)