The U.S. Senate on Friday confirmed David Cummins, a senior vice president at Serco, to serve as head of the Transportation Security Administration. The vote, which approved Cummins along with dozens of other nominees, passed 51-47.
Also confirmed in the same roll call were nominees to a range of federal bodies, including positions on the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the National Transportation Safety Board and the Surface Transportation Board. The Senate approved Christopher Phelan to chair the White House Council of Economic Advisers and Cameron Hamilton to lead the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Cummins arrives at the agency as the administration pursues a strategy to shrink TSA staffing and to move screening operations at smaller airports into private hands. In April, the president proposed eliminating more than 9,400 positions and trimming just over $1.5 billion - roughly 20% - from the agency's annual budget. The budget proposal applies to the TSA, which the White House lists as a 60,000-employee organization responsible for airport security operations.
Serco, the company where Cummins serves as a senior vice president, provides engineering, information technology and training services to federal, state and local governments as well as to commercial customers.
The White House plan also includes a requirement for smaller airports to engage private security screeners rather than rely on TSA employees. The administration projects this shift would reduce the TSA payroll by more than 4,500 jobs as an initial step toward a broader effort to privatize functions of the agency that was created after the September 11, 2001, attacks.
Several airports have indicated interest in or plans to move forward with privatized screening. Airports in Tampa, Des Moines, Iowa, and Charleston, South Carolina, said recently that they plan to proceed with privatizing airport security. Meanwhile, around 20 airports - including those in San Francisco, Kansas City and Sarasota, Florida - have used private security screeners for years.
The confirmation and privatization push come against a backdrop of workforce and operational strains earlier this year. A prolonged government shutdown this spring left roughly 50,000 TSA workers without pay for six weeks, producing major disruptions at airports with security wait times stretching to four hours or more in some cases.
Airlines for America, the trade group representing major U.S. airlines, has stated its opposition to the White House proposal that would require smaller airports to switch to private security screeners instead of maintaining TSA-provided staff.
Leadership at the agency has been in transition. The president dismissed then-TSA head David Pekoske on his first day in office in 2025 and did not nominate a successor for 16 months. Pekoske had been nominated by the president during his first term, and was previously nominated by the former administration for a second five-year term.
Context and implications: Cummins takes office as the administration advances policy measures that, if implemented, would reshape the employment profile of TSA and shift screening responsibilities at smaller airports to private contractors. Several airports have already indicated plans to pursue privatization, while industry groups such as Airlines for America oppose a mandatory switch.