Democrats press CISA’s acting chief over major staffing cuts

Democrats on the House Homeland Security Committee pressed the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s acting director on workforce reductions and internal developments Wednesday as lawmakers examined the agency’s direction under the second Trump administration.

Madhu Gottumukkala, CISA’s acting director, testified before the panel alongside top officials from other agencies. He rehashed CISA’s efforts over the past year to better align its work with its statutory authorities and sought to defend major cost-cutting measures that have seen around a third of the cyber agency’s employees leave in the past 12 months.

CISA is “executing a mission-first approach” by “prioritizing what works, eliminating duplication and ensuring that every product and service directly advances CISA’s regulatory mission” in a way that aligns with the goals of the Trump administration, Gottumukkala said in his opening remarks. He also hinted at plans to pursue hiring this year, saying the agency would “continue targeted hiring” for key roles.

He did not provide a figure for Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., the ranking member of the panel, when asked how many staffing vacancies are currently in the cyber agency. 

“I’m just trying to get to a number that you started with and what the president cut," Thompson said. “I mean, it should be easy for you to just come up and say, ‘I lost a third of my people, but I’m able to accomplish the mission.’”

Workforce and budget decisions were frequently raised by other committee Democrats. Gottumukkala did not give a “yes” or “no” response to Rep. Lou Correa, D-Calif., when asked if money recently appropriated to the Department of Homeland Security — which houses CISA — would be enough for the cyber agency to carry out its mission.

The nation’s main civilian cyberdefense office has undergone major workforce shifts since early last year, as DHS has sought to refocus the agency back to its “core mission” amid past GOP misgivings about its activities during the Biden administration, namely that the agency engaged in censorship of Americans’ free speech.

Those claims stem from CISA’s previous collaboration with social media platforms to remove false information online concerning the COVID-19 pandemic, elections and other divisive subjects around 2020.

Rep. James Walkinshaw, D-Va., repeatedly asked Gottumukkala if the agency conducted an analysis into whether it has sufficient staffing levels after cuts to its workforce, including reduction notices issued to employees amid last year’s government shutdown.

“The work that we do is mission-focused, which means capability is measured by outcomes, not headcount,” he replied. “We support every single statutory authority given to us as we support every single one of [those] for the mission.”

“Okay, so there is no analysis,” Walkinshaw said. “You’ve managed to answer none of my questions,” he later added.

Asked after the hearing about the line of questioning, committee chairman Rep. Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y., told reporters that “a lot of important issues were brought up at the hearing, and I think there will be follow-up questions from both sides.”

“There’s always going to be the technical questions with numbers. So I think, you know, it’d be great to have the specific answers to numbers. You know, who left, when they leave, what’s going on,” he added.

Across DHS, employees in CISA and other department units have been marked for reassignments to agencies focused on the Trump administration’s border security and deportation work, Nextgov/FCW previously reported.

Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., pressed Gottumukkala about the reassignments, but he said those occurred “not in my time.” It’s not clear what he meant, as the management-directed workforce transfers were underway after he entered his role in May of last year.

At the end of the hearing, Thompson, the ranking member, submitted to the record a CISA staffing chart documenting workforce changes since Trump took office, which listed 65 involuntary reassignments and 998 departures.

Gottumukkala also pushed back on questions tied to recent headlines about internal incidents under his leadership, including reports that he failed a polygraph exam and that he was involved in the reassignment of well-regarded CISA Chief Information Officer Bob Costello, which was quickly reversed. He was also asked about reported plans to build a secure intelligence facility in South Dakota for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, to which he said he wasn’t aware of the specifics but acknowledged he generally knew of the plans.

All three of those cases were first reported by Politico. Nextgov/FCW verified the existence of the failed polygraph, as well as the cancelled transfer of Costello, from people familiar with both situations, but could not independently confirm plans regarding the South Dakota facility.

“I do not accept the premise of that characterization, and I’m not going to discuss the testing outcomes or clearance matters in an open session,” he told Thompson when asked whether he failed the polygraph exam.

In the case of Costello, he told Thompson that individual personnel decisions “are not made in a vacuum” and that those transfers are made “at the highest levels, and we work according to how we see the roles fit.” 

Asked about Gottumukkala’s polygraph incident, Garbarino said he knows of an investigation and that certain staff have been put on administrative leave. “I understand that this has been a six-month ongoing investigation now. I would hope that that would get completed. I think it’s the Office of General Counsel there that’s handling it.”

On the Bob Costello matter, he deferred back to Gottumukkala’s responses in the hearing.

“I don’t know whose decisions it is … but it was stopped, which is probably a good thing,” Garbarino said.