Senate committee advances Trump nominee to lead cybersecurity agency that protects election systems

NEW YORK (AP) — A U.S. Senate committee voted Wednesday to advance President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the agency that secures the nation’s critical infrastructure, including election systems.

Members of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee voted 9-6 to recommend Sean Plankey ’s nomination for director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, known as CISA, which sits under the Department of Homeland Security.

The agency has been dealing with workforce and funding cuts, as well as criticism from Republicans over some of its election-related activities.

Plankey, who retired from the U.S. Coast Guard in 2023, 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.

If confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate, he will inherit an agency that has been mired in partisan tensions over the role it should play in combating false claims about voting or election fraud. Those claims have led to a lack of trust among Republicans in election workers and voting machines since Trump started lying about widespread fraud leading to his loss in the 2020 election. A majority of Republicans still believe that Democrat Joe Biden was not legitimately elected president in 2020.

CISA is tasked with protecting the nation’s critical infrastructure, from dams and power plants to banks and voting systems.

It has received praise from state election officials of both parties for its work protecting those systems. But it also has been sharply criticized by Republicans who claim its efforts to counter misinformation about elections and the COVID-19 pandemic veered into censorship. During her Senate hearing in January to be homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem said the agency had strayed “far off mission.”

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.

CISA worked with other federal agencies in 2024 to alert the public to various foreign misinformation campaigns related to the election.

During his July 24 confirmation hearing, Plankey faced some pointed questions about election security.

When Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., asked him if the 2020 election was rigged and stolen, Plankey did not answer directly. Instead, he said he had not reviewed that election’s cybersecurity and that his personal opinions were not relevant. He acknowledged that Biden’s victory was confirmed by the Electoral College and that he was sworn in.

Blumenthal then pressed Plankey on what he would do if Trump later pushed him to falsely claim the 2026 or 2028 elections were rigged.

“Senator, as a cybersecurity professional, these are state-run elections,” Plankey answered. “I have not reviewed the cybersecurity posture of all 50 states. That’s like a doctor who’s diagnosing somebody over the television because they saw him on the news.”

“No,” Blumenthal replied. “It’s like a doctor who has a patient come to him and is responsible for doing the diagnosis.”

The senator called Plankey’s answers “unsatisfactory” and accused him of “undermining the confidence of the nation in the election apparatus.”

Plankey also will face a challenge leading an agency that is undergoing structural changes during Trump’s second term. That includes funding and workforce cuts and the pausing of election security work pending a Homeland Security review.

Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., asked Plankey how he would ensure the agency’s statutory requirements are met, given the expected multimillion-dollar budget cuts and personnel leaving the agency.

The nominee said he had learned through his leadership experience to “allow the operators to operate” and praised the cybersecurity capabilities of the agency’s staff. He said he would reorganize CISA or ask for more money if needed.

Plankey’s advancement comes as the ranking Democrats on the House and Senate committees overseeing elections have sent multiple letters to CISA leadership requesting information about its workforce cuts and the status of its efforts to support election infrastructure. They have not received a response.

Trump signed an executive order earlier this year directing the U.S. Justice Department to investigate former CISA head Chris Krebs and strip his security clearances. Krebs became a target of Trump’s ire after he insisted the 2020 election was secure and that ballot counts were accurate.