The Independent View: Air Force Comptroller to Step-In as Acting Secretary After Inauguration

Air Force Comptroller, John P. Roth, will Temporarily take over as Acting Air Force Secretary before Biden Names his pick to run the Department, among a slew of other Fiscal Officials who will Oversee their Respective Services.

Temporarily heading up the other Military Service Departments will be: Navy Comptroller, Thomas W. Harker; and Army Comptroller, John E. Whitley; and Stacy A. Cummings, will take over as the Pentagon’s Acting Acquisition Boss.

Barbara M. Barrett, who has served as the 25th Air Force Secretary for just over a year, is departing Jan. 20th when the Biden Administration is sworn in. Roth is also slated to leave the Air Force alongside multiple other High-Ranking Service Officials, but will stick around at least briefly to Manage the Daily Civilian Oversight of the Air Force and Space Force’s nearly 700,000 Employees.

Roth oversees the Department of the Air Force’s $207 Billion Budget and Performed the duties of the Undersecretary of the Air Force for several months in 2019 and 2020. The Comptroller began his Military Career in the Navy but joined the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense in 1984 and the Air Force in 2018.

“John shepherded the Space Force’s first presidential budget and landed a $15 billion fledgling service budget,” Barrett said at a Jan. 14th Goodbye Ceremony ahead of next week’s Administration Change. “John collaborated with the Office of the Secretary of Defense and all nine major commands to secure more than $1.6 billion to facilitate the department’s [coronavirus] response. And due to John’s negotiations, the Air Force garnered important topline budget growth, which allowed the department to increase total force strength by 14,000 Airmen, setting the foundation for readiness recovery.”

Barrett, a former Federal Aviation Administration Deputy Administrator, Ambassador, and Businesswoman, has Not Disclosed what she plans to do after leaving the Pentagon. “I have learned so very much,” she said. “It has been an unprecedented time, even just this past year, with reforms, modernization, and activity. … Oh, yes—and the pandemic, hurricanes beyond measure, through the alphabet and back again, forest fires in unprecedented volume, civil unrest, and those continuing wars.”