The Senate confirmed David Turk to be deputy secretary of energy on Tuesday, voting 98-2 to install the former Obama official and Biden staffer as the Department of Energy’s No. 2.
Only Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) voted no. Turk had not been sworn in at DOE as of deadline Thursday for Weapons Complex Monitor.
Turk was most recently deputy executive director of the International Energy Agency. He served in the Obama administration’s State and Energy departments, working on climate issues and the New Start nuclear arms-control treaty with Russia.
Before Obama was elected, and Biden became Obama’s vice president, Turk was a member of Biden’s Senate staff.
Turk cleared the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee with a unanimous vote on March 11. In his confirmation hearing March 4, Turk pledged to examine the new Department of Energy subcontracting policies at the Hanford Site in Washington state that have some local small business owners worried about the future of their companies.
These small businesses owners say they were surprised by DOE changes that, effective in January, put new prime contractors at the former plutonium production site in charge of work that used to be handled by independent businesses under subcontracts.
