President Donald Trump has officially nominated the leader of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s nuclear weapons programs to run weapons programs for the full U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration.
The White House sent Charles Verdon’s nomination to the Senate late Tuesday, only a day after announcing the president’s intent to nominate the Livermore hand as deputy administrator for defense programs at the semiautonomous Department of Energy agency.
The Senate Armed Services Committee had not scheduled a nomination hearing for Verdon at deadline Wednesday for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing. If approved by the committee and confirmed by the full Senate, he would take charge of a roughly $9-billion-a-year NNSA weapons portfolio that, if Congress approves the White House’s fiscal 2019 budget request, could grow to $11 million annually