Army Secretary Dan Driscoll on Wednesday announced that he had rescinded a U.S. Military Academy at West Point job offer given to the former director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, a move that came less than 24 hours after far-right activist Laura Loomer criticized the hiring.
Jen Easterly, who led CISA under former President Biden, is a West Point graduate and was planning to serve as the next Robert F. McDermott Distinguished Chair in the school’s Department of Social Sciences.
But Loomer, in a Tuesday post to X that tagged Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, decried the hiring, declaring that “some of your underlings are trying to screw you,” at the Defense Department.
“There are clearly a lot of Biden holdovers at DOD undermining the Trump admin,” Loomer wrote, questioning Easterly’s appointment. “Who the hell is doing the hiring over at DOD? It’s horrendous.”
Loomer also claimed that while Easterly was CISA director she “brought in” Nina Jankowitz, a former Department of Homeland Security official who ran the now‑shuttered Disinformation Governance Board, casting her as a group of “Biden holdovers who worked to silence Trump supporters.”
Driscoll in a post to X on Wednesday revealed a new memo that rescinded Easterly’s offer without explanation, paused outside groups from selecting West Point employees or instructors, and directed the chair of the school’s Board of Visitors “to conduct a full review of the Academy’s hiring practices.”
In another post to X highlighting the Army memo, chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell defended the decision.
“We’re not turning cadets into censorship activists. We’re turning them into warriors & leaders,” Parnell wrote. “We’re in the business of warfighting.”
A LinkedIn post that had announced Easterly’s hiring has since been removed.
Loomer, a staunch ally of President Trump with a history of making incendiary comments, has been known to be an influence on decision-making in the administration.
Earlier this year, she met with Trump in the Oval Office to raise concerns about certain National Security Council staffers who were later fired.
Easterly’s pulled offer also comes as the Trump administration is playing an unprecedented direct role in the decisions at U.S. military academies, including its curriculum, hired staff, and censorship of books and topics.
Earlier this month the first female head of the U.S. Naval Academy, Vice Adm. Yvette Davids, was redelegated from her post as the first female superintendent of the academy in Annapolis, Md., to the largely invisible role of deputy chief of naval operations.
