National cyber director position, which Congress mandated in a defense bill last year, remains unfilled two months into Biden's admin due to political turf wars
Two months into the Biden administration, the national cyber director job created by Congress in a defense bill is still empty, stalled by interagency and congressional turf fights over who owns federal cyber policy. The administration broke the impasse weeks later by nominating ex-NSA deputy director Chris Inglis as the first director alongside Jen Easterly for CISA [[a:965160]].
The resolution proved partial: when the Senate confirmed Inglis that June, Congress still had not funded his office despite authorizing him to hire 75 employees [[a:967568]] — so the position this article describes as hostage to politics was soon filled on paper but hollowed out in practice.
First-order effects
Federal cyber coordination sits without a single accountable lead while agencies defend their own lanes; the White House has no director to arbitrate between them.
Second-order effects
Even after Inglis is confirmed months later, an unfunded mandate leaves the office unable to staff up, shifting real cyber operational weight onto CISA under Jen Easterly and the existing agency players.
Third-order effects
The vacancy-and-underfunding pattern outlives the administration: CISA enters Trump's second term still operating without a Senate-confirmed leader amid job cuts and a demoralized workforce [[a:1163922]], while the government simultaneously chases roughly 600,000 open cybersecurity roles across public and private sectors [[a:973603]] — leadership churn compounding a chronic talent shortage.
The trend: US federal cyber leadership keeps getting mandated faster than it gets staffed, leaving coordination gaps that persist across administrations.
I have no idea about the relationship between these individuals but I for darn sure would want to figure out the lanes of the road between the two roles before naming the senate confirmed one. https://twitter.com/...
I am not convinced we need a cyber czar, and this reads like we envision the role as more of a national cyber incident response position. There is more to defense than just reacting. https://www.politico.com/... https://twitter.com/...
NEW: The admin is still without a National Cyber Director as it attempts to respond to multiple cyber attacks and espionage campaigns. New details on the turf wars and political battles keeping open a role that Congress created and is demanding be filled: https://www.politico.com…
The failure to fill the national cyber director role comes as the new administration grapples with how to kick suspected Russian and Chinese hackers out of federal cyber infrastructure following two major breaches https://www.politico.com/...
“The NCD is needed to work the day-to-day deconfliction and institutionalize plans for preventing and, when that fails, responding to the next crisis,"@SpauldingSez said. “And the next crisis could be tomorrow, so time is not on our side.” https://twitter.com/...
The Biden White House is facing multiple cyber attacks & cyber espionage campaigns targeting U.S. companies and government agencies, without the services of a cybersecurity czar to coordinate a response and keep lawmakers in the loop. From @NatashaBertrand https://www.politico.co…