Progressive legislators Reps. Mark Pocan (D-WI) and Barbara Lee (D-CA) have written an open letter to President-elect Biden calling on him to not appoint a secretary of defense who has connections to the defense industry. That’s a problem for Biden, as his frontrunners for the job are former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michele Flournoy, who’s on the board of Booz Allen Hamilton, and former Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson, who’s on the board of Lockheed Martin. “We strongly encourage you to reject the mistaken nominations of the Trump era; and, again, commit to appointing Secretaries of Defense with no previous ties to defense contractors,” they write in a letter released Thursday.
