Ken Isaacs

Vice President, Programs & Government Relations, Samaritan's Purse

As vice president of programs and government relations, Ken Isaacs oversees all international relief projects for Samaritan's Purse. Isaacs has more than 35 years of experience working in the relief and development communities, and his work has taken him to nearly 150 countries in response to global emergencies resulting from wars, complex crises, famines and natural disasters. He has testified multiple times before House and Senate committees and subcommittees, including the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and House International Relations Committee.

Isaacs has served on the ground in response to foreign disasters and aid projects. He has directed major relief operations around the world since 1991, including Samaritan's Purse' work in Rwanda during the 1994 genocide. Isaacs also coordinated relief efforts in Liberia during the Ebola crisis, following massive earthquakes in China and Haiti, and following the devastating cyclones that hit Myanmar and the Philippines. In addition, he designed and implemented emergency relief programs in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, Bosnia, Cambodia, Honduras, El Salvador, Kosovo, Turkey, Afghanistan, Nepal, Haiti, Japan and the Philippines.

Under the leadership of Isaacs, Samaritan’s Purse deployed five Emergency Field Hospitals in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. From these mobile hospitals, specially configured as respiratory care units, Samaritan’s Purse medical personnel treated more than 900 patients in northern Italy, New York City, the Bahamas, western North Carolina, and LA County, California. Isaacs also oversaw emergency relief efforts in Beirut, Lebanon following a devastating explosion and in Ethiopia as internal conflict left millions in need of food assistance.

During his career, Isaacs has also served as director of the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA) within the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Under his direction, OFDA served as the lead agency for U.S. government relief responses to the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami and 2005 Pakistan earthquake. He also oversaw U.S. humanitarian relief efforts in Darfur and South Sudan, and emergency responses in Ethiopia and Niger.

Isaacs was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from Health Outreach to the Middle East for leading a response that deployed a Samaritan’s Purse Emergency Field Hospital to the outskirts of Mosul, Iraq as Iraqi Security Forces fought to regain control of the city.

Isaacs often speaks at universities, as well as national and international conferences, about complex humanitarian crises with a focus on emergency assistance and disaster relief. He has two sons and four grandchildren. Ken lives in Boone, North Carolina