A key group of Northern Virginia's leading conservative women, including Kate Obenshain and Maiselle Dolan Shortley recently hosted a reception for VA-11 Republican candidate Suzzanne Scholte at the McLean home of Mrs.Shortley.
Suzanne Scholte has served since 1988 as the President of the Defense Forum Foundation, a non-profit foundation that promotes a strong national defense and freedom, democracy, and human rights abroad. DFF is best known for its Congressional Defense and Foreign Policy Forums, a non-partisan forum which brings expert speakers to Capitol Hill to address critical issues facing America as well as its work in Asia and North Africa.
Recognizing that the regimes that are a threat to the United States are also without exception a threat to their own people, Scholte expanded DFF’s mission to promote aggressively democracy, freedom, and human rights abroad. As a result, she has hosted defectors on Capitol Hill from China, Cuba, North Korea, Iran, and other nations. She has received international acclaim for her work for the liberation of the people of North Korea and the people of Western Sahara, two countries cited regularly as among the most persecuted people in the world by Freedom House, Human Rights Watch, and Open Doors. North Koreans are arguably the most persecuted people in the world, and the Sahrawi, the people of Western Sahara, represent arguably the most pro-West Muslim people in the world.
Scholte has testified numerous times in Congress and at the United Nations, and has given hundreds of speeches all over the world. She is widely credited with being the driving force behind the North Korea human rights movement, and the awareness on Capitol Hill today, of both the situation facing the people of North Korea and the people of Western Sahara.
Suzanne Scholte's resume includes such distinguished accomplishments as:
President, Defense Forum Foundation since 1988
Chairman and Founding Member, North Korea Freedom Coalition
Honorary Chairman, Free North Korea Radio
Vice Chairman and Founding Board Member, Committee for Human Rights in North Korea
Founding Member and Chairman, U.S. -Western Sahara Foundation
Board of Directors, Christian Solidarity Worldwide-USA
Executive Committee, Susan B. Anthony List
Suzanne Scholte attended high school in Northern Virginia. She settled there after college in 1981. She and her husband of thirty years, Chadwick Gore, have raised their three sons in Fairfax County. Two sons graduated from Jeb Stuart High School, while their third son plans to be a future Jeb Stuart graduate. He currently attends Immanuel Christian School. All three sons attended Sleepy Hollow Elementary School. Her oldest son attended the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. Her second son graduated from Virginia Military Institute, and now serves as a 2nd Lieutenant in the U.S. Army at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, with the 75th Fires Brigade.
Suzanne Scholte's volunteer work has included serving for several years as a literacy council tutor with the Literacy Council of Northern Virginia and as a newsletter editor for her civic association. A graduate of William and Mary, Suzanne Scholte has been a kindergarten Sunday School teacher since 1994 at The Falls Church Anglican.
