The internal security threat the U.S. faces right now is serious. We need a Secretary of Defense on the job immediately. I will vote to confirm Lloyd Austin and grant him a waiver, and I urge other Senators to do the same.

In 2017 I voted against granting a waiver for Jim Mattis. My constituents should rightfully ask, what’s different now?

First, the immediacy of the threat to our country requires DoD to have leadership in place without delay. But that’s not the only thing that’s changed.

A general at DoD was especially worrying under Trump. Trump had zero foreign policy experience, a penchant to glorify violence, a total neophyte Secretary of State, and an unstable, war mongering former general as NSA.

All of this is different under Biden. Biden has loads of experience and a built in healthy skepticism of military action. The balance of power in his national security team lies with Blinken, Sullivan, Burns, Power, Kerry, Thomas-Greenfield, all diplomats.

Progressives should push hard to assure that State, not DoD, takes the lead in confronting security threats, since most modern threats are non-military in nature. We should also argue for a much bigger budget for State and USAID, and frugality at DoD.

But there is simply much less reason to be fearful of a recently retired general running DoD under Biden. This reality, plus the elevated threat level, requires me to vote to get Lloyd Austin in place as soon as possible.