The Senate this week approved Nickolas Guertin to serve as the Navy’s acquisition executive, giving the sea service a chief weapons buyer nearly three years into the Biden administration.
The upper chamber confirmed Guertin in a voice vote on Wednesday.
The White House first announced plans to nominate Guertin to serve as the assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition in September 2022. His confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee took place six months later, in March 2023.
Once he is sworn in, Guertin will be the first Senate-approved Navy RDA since James “Hondo” Geurts, who was the service’s chief acquisition executive during the Trump administration. Jay Stefany, a career civil servant, has filled in on a temporary basis since Geurts left in January 2021. Since November 2021, Stefany has been performing the duties of the assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition, and before that was the acting ASN RDA since the end of the Trump administration.
During his confirmation hearing, Guertin spoke of the work force, supply chain and recruitment challenges facing the Navy since the COVID-19 pandemic.
Guertin has served as the Pentagon’s Director of Operational Test and Evaluation since December 2021.
