Mark Esper was sworn in this week as the secretary of defense after the Senate confirmed him Tuesday by a landslide vote, ending months of uncertainty about the Pentagon’s leadership.
Esper, who previously served as Army secretary since 2017, was confirmed by a vote of 90-8 Tuesday. President Donald Trump swore him in that night. Eight Democrats voted against his confirmation, and two senators – Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) and presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) did not vote.
Esper is the first permanent defense secretary since former Secretary Jim Mattis was forced to resign early on Dec. 31, 2018. Former Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan took over as acting defense secretary on Jan. 1 until his own abrupt resignation from the Pentagon on June 23.
Esper then served as acting defense secretary until his nomination was formally sent to the Senate on July 15, at which point Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer took over the acting secretary role until Esper was confirmed Tuesday.
Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) Chairman Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) has been pushing to have Esper confirmed as soon as possible, and widely praised the awaited vote Tuesday.
“It’s not very often we have someone that is enthusiastically supported by Republicans, by Democrats, and he is obviously the right person,” Inhofe said, adding. “He has the trust of our president, the trust of our military, the trust of Congress and the country to keep our nation safe.”
The eight Democrats who voted against Esper’s confirmation included five presidential candidates: Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) Oregon Democratic Sens. Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden also voted no, as did Warren’s Democratic colleague from Massachusetts, Sen. Ed Markey.
Warren, a SASC member along with Gillibrand, grilled Esper on his past experience as a lobbyist for major defense contractor Raytheon during his July 16 confirmation hearing, providing the main point of tension in an otherwise supportive hearing.
In written testimony for his confirmation hearing last week, Esper said the $30-year, $1 trillion modernization and maintenance program for the U.S. nuclear arsenal is “sufficient to support the full modernization of the nuclear triad.”
Esper was critical of the U.S.-Russian New START treaty, signed during the Obama administration, which limits both nations to deploying no more than 1,550 strategic nuclear warheads on 700 fielded delivery systems. The accord, among other weaknesses, “does not capture Russia’s improving and increasing arsenal of nonstrategic nuclear weapons,” Esper stated.
Still, Esper wrote, “New START Treaty extension could potentially fit into a new arms control framework provided the net result improves the security of the United States and of our allies and partners.”
The treaty is scheduled to expire in February 2021, but can be extended for five years. The Trump administration has suggested it does not support extension.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, defended her vote to confirm Esper in a Tuesday statement, saying, “I am greatly concerned about the lack of stable leadership at the Department of Defense and the message it sends to our adversaries.”
“I believe it is imperative that there be a steady hand at the Department to lead our men and women in uniform and address the many troubling threats to national security around the globe,” Shaheen continued, saying she appreciated Esper’s leadership of the Army.
Esper retired from the Army in 2007 after spending 10 years on active duty and 11 years in the National Guard and Army, and subsequently worked for the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank and as a staff member on Capitol Hill.
He served as legislative director and senior policy adviser to former Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), who later served as defense secretary from 2013 to 2015. Esper also was a senior professional staff member on the Senate Foreign Relations and Senate Government Affairs committees, served as policy director for the House Armed Services Committee, and as national security adviser for former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.). He also has experience as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for negotiations policy at the Pentagon.
Esper’s industry support experience includes stints as the Aerospace Industries Association’s chief operating officer and executive vice president of defense and international affairs, and later as vice president for government relations at Raytheon. He holds a Master of Public Administration degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a doctorate in Public Policy from George Washington University.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, the Senate Armed Services Committee held a confirmation hearing for David Norquist to become the next deputy secretary of defense. The committee agreed to expedite Norquist’s nomination, as they did with Esper. Norquist is the undersecretary of defense and chief comptroller for the Pentagon.
Norquist had served as acting deputy secretary of defense since Jan. 1. Once the Senate received his nomination, he stepped back into his previous role as Pentagon comptroller, and Spencer is now performing the duties of deputy secretary.
Unlike Esper in his consideration for defense secretary, Norquist was not legally required to step down from his role as acting deputy secretary while the Senate considers his nomination, but did so in deference to Congress, according to a Pentagon spokesman.
This story first appeared in Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor affiliate publication Defense Daily.
