Warren investigates Pentagon’s plan to hire high-paid private sector workers

Sen. Elizabeth Warren has expressed concerns about the Pentagon’s plans to hire private sector experts to improve contracting and capital allocation, warning that it could raise “significant conflicts of interest and revolving door concerns” in a letter first shared with CNBC.

In February, the Pentagon created the Defense Contractor Program to incorporate private sector talent into the department’s acquisition process. Later, reports in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal revealed that the Office of Strategic Capital was also seeking help from the private sector, offering employees more than $400,000 in salaries and access to future capital to lure them away from Wall Street.

“I have long had concerns about potential conflicts of interest, revolving door abuse, and national security concerns in the Department of Defense’s acquisition process,” the Warren Democrat, D-Mass., said in a letter sent late Tuesday. “Currently, I am concerned about the national security implications and corruption concerns posed by the Pentagon’s BOND initiative and its team of Wall Street investors, and I urge the Pentagon to put in place the necessary guardrails and oversight to fully address these concerns.”

Warren was particularly concerned about a Times report that said headhunting firms were preparing recruiting slides for the Pentagon, with both access to U.S. and international government officials and access to funding channels at stake. It is unclear whether the Pentagon approved the slides.

Warren’s letter comes as the Trump administration continues to integrate the private sector and government in unprecedented ways, including taking stakes in companies that produce products vital to the national interest. The administration has also come under intense scrutiny over some of its consensus-building practices, some of which confuse the line between typical government work and the self-interest of the president, his family, and his Cabinet.

The Pentagon did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

In the letter, addressed to Deputy Secretary of Defense Stephen Feinberg and Director of Strategic Capital David Roach, Warren asked nearly 30 questions about the Pentagon’s courtship of civilian industry experts. Prior to his current role as No. 2 at the Department of Defense, Mr. Feinberg was co-CEO of Cerberus Capital Management, and Mr. Roach was a managing director.

Feinberg has created an Economic Defense Force within the Pentagon, working with the Office of Strategic Capital.

Warren asked them to list all industry experts involved in the BOND program and all companies they partner with. He also investigated whether BOND participants are classified as government employees and whether there are any ethics rules or vetting requirements for participants. He also asked whether BOND participants or individuals recruited to OSC from Wall Street had previously worked for Cerberus.

The senator also asked for a line-by-line budget explanation of how the Pentagon plans to use the $88 million requested by BOND. And she asked how the department plans to spend the $189 million it requested for economic defense and the $20.2 billion it requested for “Wall Street investor recruitment.”

Warren also asked what guardrails the Pentagon has in place to prevent conflicts of interest among government officials. Palantir, meta And OpenAI.

He also asked for details about who is or will be hired at the Pentagon and receives compensation of more than $400,000 a year, and whether bankers recruited by the Pentagon will be subject to ethical requirements during their tenure or in the future. She also asked whether the Pentagon had approved a reported slide promising access and capital to potential recruits.