Senators from Maryland and Virginia like the job acting Office of Personnel Management director Beth Cobert is doing in the wake of last year’s cyber breach and they want to make it permanent.
A year after the breach exposed the personal information 21 million people, Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va.; Tim Kaine, D-Va.; Barbara Mikulski, D-Md.; Ben Cardin, D-Md., sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Ky., asking him to bring her nomination as OPM director up for a vote.
“Considering that Ms. Cobert’s capabilities and qualifications continue to be beyond reproach, we encourage you to work to assuage concerns within your caucus and swiftly bring her nomination to the floor of the Senate for a vote,” the letter said.
Related: Read the letter
The letter comes some four months after the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee approved Cobert to become OPM director.
The hold-up in nomination process has come from Sen. David Vitter, R-La., who has vowed to block Cobert over a 2013 OPM rule that allows congressional members and their staffs to keep federal health care coverage under the Affordable Care Act by enrolling Congress as a small business in the D.C. small business exchange.
Vitter also said that his request for information was first made in 2013 and the agency still had yet to respond to it. The senator said he will let the nomination move forward once OPM responds.
In the June 9 letter to McConnell, the senators said the Vitter’s request should not outweigh the work the agency must continue to do.
“While we understand our colleague has concerns relating to OPM rulemaking that occurred well prior to Ms. Cobert’s tenure at OPM, we continue to urge him to elevate those concerns in a productive and appropriate manner rather than hamstringing the agency at a moment when strong leadership is sorely needed.”
Cobert continues to serve as the acting OPM director and as a nominee for the permanent job, but the dual role has also proven problematic. A Feb. 10 letter from the OPM inspector general said that due to a recent federal court ruling, Cobert could not be both the nominee and the acting director.
Every action made by Cobert while serving in the dual role would be made null and void if legal action was taken against it. The acting OPM director has repeatedly said that her position is within the confines of the law, per a Department of Justice guidance.
But confirming Cobert would finally put that matter to rest, and the senators’ letter presses McConnell to remove the “acting” tag from her title by bringing a confirmation vote to the floor.
“The sooner the Senate is able to provide its advice and consent in confirming Ms. Cobert’s nomination, the sooner we can put this gamesmanship behind us and focus on the important work that OPM must undertake to implement critical cybersecurity and personnel reforms,” the letter said.
