She received her bachelor's degree from Wellesley College and attended graduate school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for one year.

Senator Paul Wellstone were the alleged targets of a failed bomb plot while on an official visit to the Colombian town of Barrancabermeja.

Patterson became acting Permanent Representative to the United Nations after John Danforth resigned, effective January 20, 2005.

[citation needed] Patterson was considered for Defense Undersecretary for Policy under James Mattis; however, she was withdrawn after opposition from Tom Cotton, senator from Arkansas.

[9] Some speculated that Cotton favored an anti-Muslim Brotherhood policy and that Patterson's time as Ambassador to Egypt under President Morsi disqualified her in his eyes.

[10] Patterson served on the commission on the National Defense Strategy for the United States[11] and as the Kissinger Senior Fellow at the Yale University Jackson Institute for Global Affairs.