Cybersecurity executive tapped to lead agency that protects voting systems

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President Donald Trump has nominated a cybersecurity executive to lead the agency that works to protect the nation's critical infrastructure, one that has faced Republican criticism in recent years over its involvement in elections.

Sean Plankey, who retired from the U.S. Coast Guard in 2023, was nominated Tuesday to lead the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, known as CISA. He worked in the first Trump administration as a director for cyber policy at the National Security Council and then as a principal deputy assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Energy.

CISA was formed in 2018 during the first Trump administration and is charged with protecting the nation’s sensitive infrastructure, including dams, nuclear power plants and voting systems. Though it's under the Department of Homeland Security, CISA is a separate agency with its own Senate-confirmed director.

CISA’s first director, Chris Krebs, was fired by Trump after he highlighted a statement issued by a group of election officials that called the 2020 election the “ most secure in American history.” At the time, Trump was contesting his loss to Democrat Joe Biden and promoting false claims of widespread fraud.

The agency under both the Trump and Biden administrations has received praise from many state and local election officials. But some Republicans remain angry over its efforts to counter misinformation about the 2020 presidential election and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Trump’s new homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, said during her January Senate confirmation hearing that CISA had strayed “far off mission” and she pledged to work with senators “should you wish to rein them in.”

CISA officials have said they were never engaged in censorship and only worked with states in 2020 to help them notify social media companies about misinformation spreading on their platforms. They said the agency did not instruct or try to coerce those companies to act.

During the 2024 election, CISA and other federal agencies alerted the public to various foreign misinformation campaigns, including three fake videos linked to Russia purporting to show election misconduct in battleground states.

Under the new Trump administration, CISA officials have launched a review of the agency's work related to elections and placed more than a dozen agency employees who had worked on elections on administrative leave. Recently, the agency announced plans to cut about $10 million in annual funding from two cybersecurity initiatives, including one dedicated to helping state and local election officials.

In a letter released Tuesday by the National Association of Secretaries of State, Noem told state election officials that existing programs will allow them to access help CISA has traditionally provided. That includes security assessments of potential cyber threats and physical attacks, and how to plan for specific scenarios their offices might encounter.

The group's bipartisan executive board had urged Noem to continue the agency's services to state and local election officials.