Both the President-elect and Secretary-designate Austin believe in strong and empowered civilian voices and perspectives shaping the Department of Defense’s policies alongside military leaders, and ensuring that our defense policies are accountable to the American people.
Congress has looked to the waiver as an important tool enabling the Commander-in-Chief to choose from a broader array of distinguished leaders to helm the Department of Defense.
And the President-elect has nominated Secretary-designate Austin precisely because he believes he is the right leader for this role at this unique moment -- a moment that will require deep experience with every level of the U.S. military in order to set it back on track.
Austin embraces that the Sec of Defense is a political role and that he will be serving in a civilian capacity, having been out of the military for over 4 years. Sec Mattis had been out of the military for approximately the same amount of time when Congress granted his waiver.
Secretary-designate Austin is looking forward to speaking with Congressional leadership early on, including House leadership, and both Senate and House Armed Service Committee members.
He appreciates Congress’ role in considering this waiver, and looks forward to sharing more about his long history of service and his leadership vision for this new assignment as part of a diverse Cabinet executing the Biden-Harris administration’s security agenda.
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Back in 2015, when I was nearly 6 months pregnant @DenisMcDonough called me and asked me if I would come back to the WH to serve as Comms Director, I told him I was pregnant and expected him to wish me well, but..
instead he immediately congratulated me and asked me to think about how we could make the job and being a new Mom work. Here is what else I learned about him over the next year and a half
He welcomes a big table and pushback. He always does his homework and then some. He is a policy wonk, but in an accessible way. He used to ride his bike to the WH and wear shirts from goodwill (when he was COS), he is from a big catholic family
A few things on this Biden piece 1.Ukraine has a history of rampant corruption and they have been under pressure to address by the international community.
Shokin was one of the worst offenders.
2. The decision to push for his ouster was not just a US decision, but one that EU, reformers in Ukraine and the IMF also pushed for. The IMF was also withholding financial assistance to Ukraine contingent upon his firing.
3. Shokin was so corrupt that he was reportedly one of the biggest obstacle in the investigation of Burisa--2 months before Hunter Biden even joined Burisa’s board UK authorities requested info from Shokin and he ignored them