I. Introduction

Secretary Pete Hegseth’s ideological reshuffle of the Defense Policy Board (DPB) earlier this year made the Pentagon’s contractor-access problem even more blatant. But while the appointment of pro-Trump figures in the tech and defense sectors into a body ostensibly designed for independent advice is jarring, the board has always been a tool for industry access, not oversight.

The ability of corporate actors to embed themselves in policy-making is apparent at all levels of government. Nowhere is this more blatant than in the realm of defense policy. The concept of a “military-industrial complex”, attributed to Dwight D. Eisenhower, has persisted in the American imagination for decades. The Department of Defense contains a number of little-known boards such as the Defense Policy Board (DPB), a body that, despite its name, possesses little direct influence on policy-making. In reality, the DPB is not so much a body that provides policy-making advice as it is a vehicle for corporate capture. As international relations scholar Van Jackson noted, serving on the DPB gives members "unparalleled access to both contracts... and policy officials" while providing appointees with "credibility when they engage other parts of the [national security] state."

Hegseth, certainly the most controversial Pentagon head in decades, has used his position leading the “Department of War” to promote right-wing extremism and Trump’s authoritarianism. After conservative media pundits complained of the presence of several officials from Democratic administrations on the board, Hegseth ended the service of members across Pentagon advisory committees in April 2025. After around 14 months without members, Hegseth would announce new members of the body at the end of June 2026. New members appointed to the board encompassed a range of pro-Trump business figures from the tech and defense sectors. These appointments have made the board's status as a vehicle for commercial interests, namely those associated with the Trump family, especially blatant. 

These appointments come at a time when the Department of Defense is trying to remove even limited existing safeguards against “revolving door” corruption. The next Democratic administration should both remove Hegseth's appointees and replace the DPB and similar boards within the Pentagon whose existence serves to entrench defense contractors' interests. As outcry over Hegseth’s Pentagon tenure mounts, with even members of Congress accusing Hegseth of war crimes, it is crucial that the next administration creates real avenues for accountability within the Department of Defense. 

II. The DPB As a Pipeline for Industry Access

BACKGROUND AND LACK OF ACCOUNTABILITY

The little-known DPB was initially established in 1985 during the Reagan Administration, with the board reporting to the Under Secretary for Policy. It was established with the ostensible goal of providing top Pentagon leadership with independent advice on matters of strategy and national security. Theoretically, this encompasses everything ranging from more immediate regional defense matters to longer-term strategy. In the decades that followed, the DPB has been joined by the creation of similar, if seemingly redundant, advisory bodies, including the Defense Business Board (established in the 2000s) and the Defense Innovation Board (established in 2016). In all cases, the boards serve to give private-sector business and technology interests an increased presence within the Pentagon. This goal would likely strike most Americans as a questionable one given that the embedded relationship between the Pentagon and the private sector is widely understood.

Though the existence of federal advisory boards creates a presumption of open meetings and detailed minutes, this is inherently limited by the board’s opaque structure. A March 2023 minutes disclosure, for example, lists out only attendees and a one-line objective. A separate Federal Register notice for said meeting provided little more valuable information: said notice stated that the board’s discussion of classified material was intertwined with unclassified material to the point they could not be meaningfully separated.  

The DPB’s opaque financial transparency requirements undermine its structural integrity. As it stands, non-career civilian members are generally appointed to the board as special government employees. Under this status, said appointees file OGE Form 450 disclosures in lieu of public reports. As a result, while Pentagon officials are able to review said appointees’ financial records to investigate potential conflicts of interest, this opportunity is not extended to everyday Americans. 

Infamous former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger served on the Defense Policy Board for almost two decades, beginning in 2001 and concluding in 2020. Beyond Kissinger’s legacy as an architect for some of the most noxious U.S. foreign policy decisions, this tenure was also alarming given the conflicts of interest surrounding it. Kissinger’s near-twenty year tenure on the DPB coincided with his work running a consultancy with undisclosed clients. 

PERLE CONTROVERSY

In the 2000s, a controversy surrounding DPB chair Richard Perle brought the board, particularly its members’ relationships with the private sector, into the public eye. Perle, a former Assistant Secretary of Defense, was a noted proponent of regime change in Iraq under the premise that Saddam Hussein’s regime possessed weapons of mass destruction. Perle had already been a subject of controversy in the 1980s over conflicts of interest stemming from his support for purchasing armaments produced by a former client of his. Despite this record, Perle would serve on the DPB from 1987 to 2004, serving as chair from 2001 to 2003 at the onset of the War on Terror.

While serving at the helm of the board, Global Crossing sought Perle’s assistance in helping them navigate a CFIUS review. The company proposed retaining Perle as a special regulatory adviser for $125,000, with an additional $600,000 contingent on whether it received approval of its sale to a foreign company. At the time, a company spokesperson openly stated that “Richard Perle is providing guidance to help us through the regulatory approval process in Washington, D.C.” for its sale to buyers in both Singapore (STT) and Hong Kong (Hutchison Whampoa Ltd.). This resulted in swift condemnation from Democratic lawmakers including Rep. Jan Schakowsky. In a press release, Schakowsky stated that “No one is fooled as to why” Perle was chosen for the job, given his “access and influence within the Defense Department and the White House”. In Congress, Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) urged the Pentagon to release members’ financial disclosures and meeting minutes in light of the controversy. 

Perle ultimately resigned as DPB chair in 2003 under pressure, though he would remain as a DPB member for another eleven months. In the end, though Perle was tainted in the public eye, he was cleared of any ethical wrongdoing by the Department of Defense. It’s worth noting that Perle’s tenure as chair coincided with the tenure of board member Christopher Williams, who was noted in 2003 to be the lone DPB member who formally served as a defense industry lobbyist. 

III. Cronyism Under Trump and Hegseth

2025-2026 RESHUFFLE

In November 2020, at the tail-end of the first Trump administration, eleven members of the DPB were removed to make way for Trump loyalists. In December, a month before Trump’s insurrection attempt, a new slate featuring Newt Gingrich and Michael Pillsbury was announced. Nearly five years later, and into a new presidential term, the second Trump administration would fully restock the DPB after a guest on The Tucker Carlson Show accused the board of undermining Trump’s agenda.

After a nearly fourteen-month vacancy, Hegseth would announce the new fifteen-person body in June 2026. In a Responsible Statecraft analysis, Nick Cleveland-Stout noted that over half (eight) of the fifteen members in Hegseth’s slate had professional ties to defense contractors or foreign governments. This balance is even more extreme than the board’s 2003 composition, where nine out of thirty had contractor ties. 

Hegseth’s decision to re-appoint the DPB came months after he chose to disband the Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Services (DACOWITS), a Pentagon committee focused on women in the military. It also preceded the establishment of a “Homeland Defense Board” in September 2026, one led by Hegseth himself, yet another example of the Pentagon’s redundancies.

THE TECH RIGHT AND THE TRUMP FAMILY

The tech industry’s sharp pivot to the right in the 2020s has had an outsized influence on American politics. The emergence of the “Tech Right” has coincided with tech companies becoming increasingly comfortable embedding themselves in the defense industry. This shift was symbolically reflected in the decision of tech executives from companies including Meta and OpenAI to join the U.S. Army Reserve in 2025. Meta’s Zuckerberg has been perhaps the most prominent tech executive to embrace this pivot towards the defense sector, mending his relationship with past employee Palmer Luckey to collaborate with Anduril on defense tech. Just days after the Army Reserve announcement, OpenAI Public Sector would be granted a prototype agreement with a $200 million ceiling and about $2 million initially obligated from the Pentagon.

Hegseth’s new board slate will help directly embed the Tech Right in the military-industrial complex. The new DPB’s roster includes Andreessen Horowitz co-founder Marc Andreessen, former Thiel Capital chief operating officer Blake Masters, and Palantir senior counselor Theo Wold. In August, The Guardian reported that both Andreessen Horowitz and Donald Trump Jr.-partnered 1789 Capital had co-invested in Anduril, Hadrian, and SpaceX. Anduril had received a contract with a cumulative ceiling of $20 billion from the Pentagon in March 2026. The “Tech Right” has also embedded itself in the Hegseth-era Pentagon through appointments such as venture capitalist Shaun Maguire to the Pentagon’s Science, Technology and Innovation Board (STIB). Maguire, known for his right-wing views, has led investments into companies including SpaceX and xAI.

Michael Pillsbury, a 2020 Trump DPB appointee who earlier in 2026 joined American Global Strategies as an advisor, was re-appointed to the board. The firm, led by former National Security Advisor Robert C. O’Brien, has received support from the CCIA, a major tech industry trade group whose members include industry giants like Amazon and Apple. Both the group and its members have fought proposed antitrust legislation by claiming they pose a threat to national security. It’s worth noting that O’Brien himself has publicly opposed tech antitrust efforts under the premise that it would benefit China. The new board features other individuals with more conventional ties to the military-industrial complex, including former Sen. Norm Coleman (R-MN), noted for his work lobbying on behalf of Saudi Arabia. More recently, Coleman filed FARA paperwork in May 2026 for potential Venezuela-related work just months after the ousting of Nicolás Maduro; Coleman would be chosen by Hegseth as vice chair of the new board the following month.

IV. Need for Course Correction

APPROACH BY PAST DEMOCRATIC ADMINISTRATIONS

The Trump administration’s ideological reshuffling of the DPB underscores the need for the next Democratic administration to pursue real Pentagon reform. Unfortunately, past Democratic administrations have not deviated from Washington norms surrounding the Pentagon and private sector’s relationship. 

During the 2020 transition period, observers raised concern surrounding Biden’s decision to appoint a number of former consultants associated with WestExec Advisors, including firm founder Antony Blinken as Secretary of State. The firm’s work with the defense sector and general refusal to disclose its clientele made observers concerned that Biden’s administration would stay the course when it comes to the revolving door between the security state and the private sector. Once in office, Biden would continue the tradition of populating the DPB with defense policy insiders. This was not unlike his decision to appoint Lloyd Austin, at the time a board member at Raytheon, to serve as Secretary of Defense despite clear conflict of interest concerns. After leaving the Pentagon, Austin would go on to found Clarion Strategies, which would quickly draw revolving door concerns of its own. 

A review of a December 2022 minutes document lists seventeen board members in attendance, including several with contemporaneous private-sector roles with connections to defense, government contracting, or strategic consulting. This included Michèle Flournoy, a co-founder of WestExec Advisors, who was serving on the board of Booz Allen. It also notably included B.J. Penn, who sat on the board of Lone Star Analysis, a firm that was awarded a Navy contract with a maximum value of $22.2 million in 2021. An additional attendee of note was Herman Bulls, the vice chair of JLL, a major player in private military family housing. Later on, Rexon Ryu, president of The Asia Group, would be appointed as a member of the board. As noted by foreign policy journalist Jonathan Guyer, though the Asia Group’s specific clients are officially confidential, the firm is known to work on behalf of companies in the defense and aerospace sectors. In a 2021 financial disclosure document, Kurt Campbell, co-founder of the Asia Group, listed Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman as among the firm’s clients. 

In 2016, Obama-era Secretary of Defense Ash Carter would establish the Defense Innovation Board amid a broader effort to build the Pentagon’s relationship with Silicon Valley. Under Biden, Michael Bloomberg was chosen to lead the Defense Innovation Board in 2022, a position first held in the Obama era by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt. At the time, critics raised concerns over Bloomberg’s nomination given the lack of sufficient public disclosures into potential financial conflicts of interest.

V. Conclusion

In 2025, congressional Democrats introduced legislation to enact stricter rules on so-called special government employees (SGEs) in response to Elon Musk’s influence. The SEER Act, introduced in both chambers by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-NM), would require public financial disclosures and proactively published conflict waivers from many SGEs. As drafted, these requirements would include committee chairs and vice chairs, but would not apply to members “serving on an advisory committee.” Though the bill is well intentioned, similar legislation that would also apply to boards including the DPB should be pursued in order to rein in pervasive conflicts of interest.

Ideally, Congress would pursue the abolition of the DPB and similar bodies that serve as conduits for contractor access in favor of truly independent standing commissions tasked with Pentagon oversight. Limited past efforts, such as the Commission on Wartime Contracting created in 2008, helped shed light on contractor fraud during the War on Terror. A more ambitious endeavor would be pursuing the re-establishment of the Truman Committee as proposed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) in 2024 with the goal of investigating “war profiteering and price gouging in the American military industrial complex.”