The Trump White House has nominated the US technology firm Palantir’s Chief Information Security Officer, Michael LoSapio, to step into the role of the Director of the country’s top cyber agency, CISA.
The role has been vacant since January 2025, when Jen Easterly resigned from the role on the same day as Donald Trump’s second inauguration.
Since then, the agency has had three Acting Directors: Bridget Bean held the role until May 2025, and Madhu Gottumukkala took the reins until February 2026. Nick Andersen currently holds the title.
LoSapio headed up Palantir’s Infrastructure and Network Security Group from 2017 to 2024, when he took on the role of CISO.
“As CISO at Palantir, I've scaled a security organisation built to stand up to the most advanced adversaries: well-resourced nation-state actors with the patience to sit inside a complex environment for months before they make a move,” LoSapio says of his current role on LinkedIn.
“Most of my week is still hands-on. I'm poking holes in our own assumptions, working the hardest problems with the engineers, and keeping the program honest about where we're strong and where we still have work to do. The team is excellent because the people on it know the systems they defend cold and that's the bar I hold everyone to.
“How I lead, though, took shape long before this job. I was a volunteer fire chief, and that's where I learned to keep my head when it counts and people are relying on me to get it right.”
Before initially joining Palantir as a Systems Engineer in 2013, LoSapio worked as a Linux Systems Engineer at the Stevens Institute of Technology, Seton Hall University, and New York University.
LoSapio is one of several dozen nominations made by the White House overnight. The nomination will now go to the Senate for approval.
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