Trump to nominate Michael Kratsios to be his first US CTO; Kratsios is currently US deputy CTO and was formerly chief of staff at Thiel Capital
For the first time in two years—and for the first time under President Trump—the U.S. is set to have a chief technology officer.
Context & Ripple Effects
Michael Kratsios has been holding the fort at the White House's technology office since 2017, when he arrived as deputy CTO after serving as chief of staff at Thiel Capital. A 2017 Wall Street Journal profile noted he was overseeing roughly 45 staff in an Office of Science and Technology Policy that had no director, making him the de facto technology voice inside the administration.
This nomination formally creates the CTO post Trump has left vacant for his first two years — and it caps an arc that continued later, when Trump named Kratsios OSTP director alongside a16z's Scott Kupor at OPM, followed by Senate confirmation and a interview laying out US plans to counter Beijing on AI. The through-line is a Thiel-network figure accumulating formal authority over federal technology policy.
First-order effects
- The US regains a chief technology officer for the first time in two years, with Kratsios promoted from deputy to the top job rather than an outside hire brought in.
Second-order effects
- Tech companies and agencies gain a single named counterpart for technology policy after two years of a director-less OSTP, concentrating access in one Thiel Capital alumnus.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds — deputy CTO, then OSTP director, then CTO — venture-capital veterans become the standard pipeline into White House technology leadership, tightening the link between Silicon Valley capital and federal tech strategy.
The trend: Silicon Valley investors and their lieutenants are being installed into formal federal technology posts, turning White House tech policy into an extension of venture networks.