Washington Weekly – August 7, 2015

August 7, 2015

The House was in recess this week. The Senate failed to invoke cloture on a motion to proceed on a measure to cut off federal funding for Planned Parenthood (S 1881). Planned Parenthood received $528.4M from the federal government in FY2014. The motion failed by a vote of 53 to 46. The Senate then called up S 754, the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, but set it aside when they could not reach agreement on amendments. The Senate confirmed General Mark Milley to be Chief of Staff of the Army, Admiral John Richardson to be Chief of Naval Operations, and Lieutenant General Robert Neller to be Commandant of the Marine Corps. The Senate also confirmed Marie Therese Dominguez to be Administrator of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, Monica Regalbuto to be Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management at the Department of Energy, Jonathan Elkind to be Assistant Secretary of International Affairs at the Department of Energy, and Joyce Connery and Joseph Hamilton to be Board Members of the Defense Nuclear Facility Safety Board.

Fiscal Year 2016 Appropriations

There are only 15 legislative days scheduled for the Senate and 12 for the House before the end of the fiscal year and government funding expires. The House and Senate Appropriations Committees have passed all of their FY16 spending bills, but floor action on the bills has been stalled in both chambers. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said this week that he would not attach language cutting federal funding for Planned Parenthood to a continuing resolution. He also reiterated that Republicans will not shut down the government nor default on the national debt.

Status of FY16 Appropriations Bills

Cybersecurity

The Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (CISA) (S 754) was brought up on the Senate floor this week, but set aside after Senators could not come to agreement on which amendments to consider. Under a deal struck before the Senate recessed, the bill will come up again in September and 21 amendments will receive votes (11 Democratic and 10 Republican).

Department of Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas responded to a July 1 letter from Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) to DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson in which Franken asked for information on how private entities share cyber threat information with the federal government, concerns the CISA legislation raises with respect to information sharing, and DHS’ policies for removing personally identifiable information. Mayorkas took the opportunity in his response letter to raise the concerns DHS has with the CISA bill.  A copy of Mayorkas’ letter to Sen. Franken can be found at:http://www.franken.senate.gov/files/documents/150731DHSresponse.pdf

Political Updates

CNN will host the first Democratic presidential debate in Nevada on October 13, with the exact location to be unveiled in the coming weeks. And the next Republican presidential debate will also be hosted by CNN on September 16 in California.

The President nominated Richard Otto Buckius to be Deputy Director of the National Science Foundation, Thomas Darling III to be Administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, Linda Etim to be Assistant Administrator for the Bureau of Africa at the US Agency for International Development, Marcel Lettre II to be Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence, former congressman Patrick Murphy to be Under Secretary of the Army at the Department of Defense, and Cherry Ann Murray to be Director of the Office of Science at the Department of Energy.

Stephen Warren, the Department of Veterans Affairs Deputy Chief Information Officer, announced this week that he will leave the agency effective Aug. 28 to become the Office of the Comptroller of Currency’s CIO. The VA has yet to pick a successor to Warren. The U.S. Secret Service appointed George Mulligan, a former director of the White House Military Office, as its first Chief Operating Officer. Mulligan comes from the Department of Defense, where he spent 29 years as both a senior civilian executive and a former naval officer. As COO, Mulligan will be the principal administrator for planning and directing all business and programming activities for the agency. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper announced that he selected Dr. Jason Matheny to be the next director of the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity, effective immediately. Dr. Matheny had been serving as Director of IARPA’s new office for Anticipating Surprise overseeing research efforts to develop new capabilities to deliver timely and accurate forecasts for a range of events relevant to national security. He served concurrently as the program manager for the Open Source Indicators program, the Foresight and Understanding from Scientific Exposition program, and the Forecasting Science and Technology program. Dr. Matheny is succeeding Dr. Peter Highnam, who moved to a position at the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency in July. Glenn Gerstell was sworn in as the General Counsel of the NSA. Gerstell is a leading legal expert in technology and cybersecurity matters. He practiced for nearly 40 years at the international law firm of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP, where he served for 18 years as the managing partner of Milbank’s Washington, D.C., office. Gerstell recently served on the D.C. Homeland Security Commission, was appointed by President Obama as a member of the National Infrastructure Advisory Council, is a Life Member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and was an elected member of the American Academy of Diplomacy.

Next Week

The House and Senate are in recess until September 8. The Senate will resume consideration of S 754, the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act when it reconvenes in September. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) have also reached an agreement to start consideration of the Iran deal when they return in September. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said that when the House returns in September they will vote on a resolution disapproving of the Iran Nuclear Agreement. The disapproval resolution was introduced by Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA) this week.