On Tuesday night, President Donald Trump fired Chris Krebs, who was one of the government’s most senior cybersecurity officials. Trump fired him—by tweet—because Krebs had thoroughly debunked election disinformation, much of which came from the White House itself.
Trump had appointed Krebs director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in 2017. CISA is charged with protecting American critical infrastructure, a vast domain ranging from elections technology to vaccine manufacturing and government systems. Many of the United States’ most sensitive networks fall under CISA’s purview. With Krebs out and Trump’s presidency ending, where does that leave one of America’s most important cybersecurity agencies?
A years-long bipartisan effort to remake the way the US government works in cyberspace could soon push CISA into an elevated role as the nation’s lead cybersecurity agency with a bigger budget, a strengthened position, and louder White House support. The future role of CISA will be key as the transitioning American government tries to sort out its strategy in increasingly combative cyberspace.
“I think CISA is in a very strong position,” says Suzanne Spaulding, Krebs’s predecessor and a person whose name has been floated as a potential secretary of homeland security in a Biden administration. “Chris Krebs’s principled stand and departure adds to CISA’s stature and reputation. There is strong bipartisan support for strengthening CISA’s role.”
The agency’s new acting director, Brandon Wales, is a career civil servant who can’t easily be fired by the president—though he could be moved to another position. Wales, a 15-year Department of Homeland Security ..
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