Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Colin H. Kahl holds a press briefing about the latest security assistance package in support of Ukraine, the Pentagon Press Briefing Room, Washington, D.C., Aug. 8, 2022. (DoD photo by Lisa Ferdinando)
Updated 5/17/23 at 3:04 pm ET with comment from Austin.
WASHINGTON — Colin Kahl, the undersecretary of defense for policy, is reportedly set to leave the Pentagon this summer, marking the first high-profile member of President Joe Biden’s Defense Department to exit.
NBC News first reported Wednesday morning that Kahl will leave the department sometime after the early July NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania. A source familiar with the situation confirmed the news and told Breaking Defense that Kahl plans to return to Stanford University, where he has technically been on leave from since joining the department.
In a statement, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin praised Kahl’s “unwavering dedication and probing intellect.
“I have personally valued Colin’s leadership and counsel, and I have been continually impressed by his seriousness of purpose, his commitment to America’s national security, and his reverence for public service,” Austin said. “Our Department is stronger and better prepared for future security challenges because of Colin’s distinguished service.”
Biden’s Pentagon has had stable civilian leadership through the first two and a half years of the administration. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Deputy Secretary Kath Hicks and Kahl were the first three officials confirmed to the department; it is widely expected Austin and Hicks will stay through at least the end of Biden’s term, if not longer if Biden should win reelection. In addition, the undersecretaries of acquisition & sustainment, finance, intelligence, personnel & readiness and research & engineering, along with the three service secretaries, have yet to turn over.
In his role, Kahl served as the point person for formulating policy inside the department, including leading the efforts on the National Defense Strategy. He also worked as a regular interlocutor with international partners, particularly with NATO as the Ukraine crisis evolved. While Kahl had a strong group of supporters throughout the administration, he always had a rocky relationship with congressional Republicans, who tried to scuttle his appointment over tweets he wrote while not in office.
Sasha Baker, the deputy undersecretary for policy, will likely become the acting USD-P. However, that “acting” title might become a long-lasting one, given politics in the Senate. In addition to Congress having to hash out major fights over the debt ceiling and budget, Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., is currently holding up the process of any civilian and uniformed nominees for the Pentagon.
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Technically, Tuberville’s move isn’t a hard-stop on nominations, but it would force each nomination to be voted on individually, rather than en bloc, which is practically infeasible for a packed congressional calendar that currently features fights about the debt ceiling, the budget and judicial nominees, all of which rank higher on the Biden administration’s priority list. And finding someone who would be willing to go through the long confirmation fights in this environment, just to hold a job for potentially less than a year should Biden lose reelection, likely isn’t going to happen.
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