On May 13, 2022, President Joe Biden announced his intention to nominate Calvin Smyre as U.S. Ambassador to the Commonwealth of The Bahamas. On May 17, 2022, the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee received the nomination.
Calvin Smyre has served for 48 years as an elected Representative in the Georgia State Assembly, was Chairman of the Democratic Caucus within the Assembly for over a decade and still serves as Chairman Emeritus of the Caucus. He is the ‘Dean’ of the Georgia House of Representatives and serves on the Appropriations, Rules, and Higher Education Committees. Smyre is President Emeritus of the National Black Caucus of State Legislators (NBCSL) and a member of the National Conference of State Legislators. He served for almost four decades as the Executive Vice President of Corporate Affairs for Synovus Financial Corporation in the private sector. He represented Synovus on the Financial Services Roundtable in Washington D.C. and was the President of the Synovus Foundation.
Smyre served on the Board of Trustees of the Medical College of Georgia Foundation, the Morehouse School of Medicine, the Jack D. Hughston Foundation, and the Fort Valley State University Foundation as its Chair. Smyre earned his B.S. from Fort Valley State University, Fort Valley, Georgia, and has received over 200 local, state, and national honors and awards. In 1985 and 2005, his peers selected him as the National “Legislator of the Year.”
