Ayotte, Defense Experts to Discuss Defense Sequestration at TechAmerica Forum

With massive, across-the-board defense sequestration cuts slated to begin in January, TechAmerica is bringing together some of the nation’s top defense experts to examine sequestration and its potential impact on the Department of Defense, the defense industrial base, as well as the U.S. economy and national security.  As a leading voice in the Senate to prevent these devastating cuts, U.S. Senator Kelly Ayotte will join a distinguished panel of experts to discuss defense sequestration and the need to bring both parties to the table now to identify ways to avert the additional cuts that Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has described as “devastating” and “catastrophic”.    

Keynote Speaker:              

US Senator Kelly Ayotte (R-NH), Ranking Member, Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support 

Expert Defense Panel:      

Lieutenant General David W. Barno, USA (Ret.), Senior Advisor & Senior Fellow, Center for a New American Security

Steven Bucci, Senior Research Fellow for Defense and Homeland Security, The Heritage Foundation

Michael O’Hanlon, Director of Research and Senior Fellow for Foreign Policy, Brookings Institution

Moderator: Gregory Keeley, Vice President, Defense, Intelligence & Homeland Security Policy, TechAmerica

Media Q & A:  Following opening remarks, Senator Ayotte and panelists will take questions from the media.

To attend, please RSVP to Angelica Hamilton at [email protected] 

Speaker Biographies

Senator Kelly Ayotte was elected to the U.S. Senate by the people of New Hampshire in 2010 and serves on the Senate Armed Services, Budget, Commerce, and Small Business Committees. She is Ranking Member of the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support. Prior to her election, she was appointed by Governor Craig Benson as the first woman to serve as New Hampshire’s attorney general.  She is married to Joe Daley, who flew combat missions during the Iraq war and recently retired as a lieutenant colonel in the Air National Guard. Senator Ayotte is a graduate of Pennsylvania State University and earned her J.D. from the Villanova University School of Law.

Lieutenant General David W. Barno, USA (Ret.) is a Senior Advisor and Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security.  General Barno, a highly decorated military officer with over 30 years of service, has served in a variety of command and staff positions in the United States and around the world, to include command at every level. He served many of his early years in special operations forces with Army Ranger battalions, to include combat in both the Grenada and Panama invasions. In 2003, he was selected to establish a new three-star operational headquarters in Afghanistan commanding U.S. and Coalition Forces in Operation Enduring Freedom. He was responsible for the overall military leadership of this complex political-military mission, devising a highly innovative counterinsurgency strategy.  General Barno is widely published and has testified before Congress numerous times.

Steven P. Bucci, Ph.D., is Senior Research Fellow for Defense and Homeland Security at the Heritage Foundation.  Bucci served for three decades as an Army Special Forces officer and top Pentagon official.  As commander of 3^rd Battalion, 5^th Special Forces, Bucci led deployments to eastern Africa, South Asia, and the Persian Gulf.  Bucci was a seasoned leader in the 82^nd Airborne as well as 5^th & 7^th Special Forces when, in July 2001, he assumed the duties of military assistant to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. Before joining Heritage in April 2012, Bucci was a lead consultant to IBM on cyber security policy. He has published numerous articles on related issues and regularly contributed to “Security Debrief,” a leading national security blog. He graduated in 1977 from the U. S. Military Academy at West Point with a bachelor of science degree in national security.

Michael E. O’Hanlon, Ph.D., Director of Research and Senior Fellow for Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution, specializes in national security and defense policy and is senior author of the Iraq and Afghanistan Index, projects. Before joining Brookings, O'Hanlon worked as a national security analyst at the Congressional Budget Office. His current research agenda includes military strategy and technology, Northeast Asia, U.S. Central Command, and defense budgets, among other defense/security issues. O’Hanlon is a member of General David Petraeus’ External Advisory Board at the Central Intelligence Agency. His most recent books include The Wounded Giant (Penguin, 2012) and Bending History (Brookings, 2012). 

Moderator – Gregory P. Keeley, Vice President Defense, Intelligence & Homeland Security Policy at TechAmerica.  Greg recently returned from deployment to Afghanistan where he was ISAF/NATO spokesman..  He provided daily briefings to the Commander ISAF/US Forces and served as personal advisor to the Deputy Commander ISAF.  Previously, while Vice President at a D.C.-based private investment  firm, Mr. Keeley provided advisory services and portfolio management to clients in the global  security, intelligence and defense sectors.  Greg also served in a number of senior advisory roles in the U.S. Congress including Spokesman and Special Advisor to the Vice Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, the Chairman of the Joint Economic Committee and a US Senator.