Acting DOD tech chief tapped for DHS CIO post

John Zangardi, currently the acting CIO of the Department of Defense, has been named by President Donald Trump to lead tech at the Department of Homeland Security.

The post was most recently held by Richard Staropoli, a friend of Trump's elder sons and a chief information security officer at a New York City hedge fund. Staropoli resigned in August after only three months on the job. Stephen Rice, DHS deputy CIO, had been holding down the top job on an acting basis.

In Zangardi, DHS gets an experienced government hand.  In addition to leading the DOD CIO operation on an acting basis, Zangardi has served as principal deputy DOD CIO and Navy Department CIO. Zangardi also served on active duty as a Navy flight officer.

Zangardi moved from the Navy to the DOD principal deputy CIO post a little over a year ago when Dave DeVries left the Pentagon to go to lead tech at the Office of Personnel Management.

DHS is budgeted to spend $6.8 billion on IT in fiscal year 2018, across its large components and headquarters. The agency is in the midst of several challenging modernization projects, including unifying immigration data systems across several components, standing up its new headquarters  on the St. Elizabeths Campus in southeast Washington, DC., as well as an enterprisewide effort to manage software licensing more efficiently and improve human resources.

The DHS CIO job is a presidential appointment, but it does not require Senate confirmation.