VA acting CIO defends IT workforce reorg amid lawmaker pushback; Waltz brushes off SignalGate questions, points finger at CISA

The Department of Veterans Affairs’ acting chief information officer doubled down on the agency’s reshaping of its IT workforce, telling lawmakers in a Monday hearing that change is “challenging” but “necessary.” Eddie Pool told members of the House VA’s subcommittee on technology modernization that the agency’s Office of Information and Technology (OIT) is pushing forward with workforce reductions as the division increasingly turns to automation and other technology modernization efforts. “This reorganization, reallocation of positions, is designed to cut bureaucratic overhead, accelerate decision making and focus every OIT position on delivering secure, reliable and modern IT solutions to improve veterans’ lives,” Pool said in opening remarks at the hearing. Subcommittee Chair Tom Barrett, R-Mich., lauded the VA OIT’s “smarter, not bigger” strategy in its fiscal 2026 budget request, asking Pool if technology improvements can alleviate the need for manual, human processes. “Absolutely,” Pool responded. “It is about automating what we can automate.” In its fiscal 2026 budget, the VA OIT requested funding to support approximately 7,000 full-time equivalent employees, marking an 11.7% decrease from its fiscal 2025 budget request, according to Carol Harris, the director of information technology and cybersecurity for the Government Accountability Office. Former White House national security adviser Mike Waltz brushed aside criticisms Tuesday that he put sensitive military operations at risk by holding discussions about military strikes in a Signal group chat, claiming the app’s use was authorized by the federal government’s top civilian cyber agency. In a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing, Waltz — who has been nominated to represent the U.S. at the United Nations — was pressed about his short tenure as President Donald Trump’s top national security official. In particular, he was grilled by Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., for his use of the end-to-end encrypted messaging application Signal to coordinate with other officials over airstrikes on Houthi rebels.While much of the initial attention was focused on Waltz adding journalist Jeffrey Goldberg to the chat, national security experts were also aghast by government officials at the highest levels coordinating highly sensitive military operations using a free application. The incident is widely viewed as contributing to Waltz’s departure just months after leaving Congress to take the role, and his subsequent shuffling to a new nomination at the U.N. “The use of Signal is not only … authorized; it was recommended in the Biden-era CISA guidance,” he said. Waltz was referencing a piece of 2024 guidance put out by CISA on mobile security. He later read from a portion of the guidance, which recommended using “only end-to-end encrypted communication” and to “adopt a free messaging application to secure communications that guarantees end to end encryption, particularly if you are a highly targeted individual, such as Signal or other apps.” The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.