William Eacho

William Carlton Eacho III (born 1954) is the former United States Ambassador to Austria. Eacho was nominated by President Barack Obama in June 2009. He was confirmed by the US Senate and sworn in during August 2009. He succeeded David F. Girard-diCarlo as ambassador in 2009 and was succeeded by Alexa Wesner in September 2013. Eacho served as Chair or Co-Chair at IFES from 2023 through 2025, The International Foundation for Electoral Systems. Eacho is a co-founder and CEO of The Partnership For Responsible Growth, a bipartisan organization advocating for US legislation for a price on carbon emissions to counter the climate change threat. Eacho also serves as Board Chair at Friends of Acadia and as Treasurer and Board of Trustees member at the American-Austrian Foundation From 2014 through 2020, Eacho was a Visiting Professor of the Practice at the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. From 2013 to 2018, Ambassador Eacho was also affiliated with the Center for Transatlantic Relations as a Distinguished Fellow, as well as visiting scholar at the Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, with an expertise in global energy, environment, and security issues. He formerly served on the Energy and Security Task Force of the International Peace Institute.

Personal life Eacho graduated magna cum laude from Duke University with a degree in Law and the Economy, a self-designed major combining political science and economics. Prior to attending Harvard Business School, from which he graduated with Distinction in 1979, he was a Financial Analyst in the Corporate Finance department of Hornblower & Weeks, in New York City, and was an associate with Loeb, Rhoades, Hornblower & Company in Los Angeles.

He and his wife, Donna, have three sons.