Prez: Barrett SECAF nominee

President Trump announced May 21 he intends to nominate Barbara Barrett, a former chairwoman of the non-profit Aerospace Corp., to be the 25the Secretary of the Air Force. She will be replacing current SECAF Heather Wilson, who will relinquish her post May 31 to become president at the University of Texas at El Paso. Sen. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.) applauded the president’s choice in a news release, saying that she had urged Trump to choose Barrett during a May 17 telephone call. McSally is a former AF A-10 pilot. Barrett has had an interest in aerospace issues having sat on the boards of the Rand and Aerospace corporations. She served on one of those boards with former AFSEC Michael Donley, and was acting as a former member of the Defense Business Board. Barrett is an instrument-rated pilot. In 2009, she trained at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Russia and Kazakhstan, and was certified for space travel. Also, Barrett was the first civilian woman to land in an F/A-18 Hornet on an aircraft carrier. It’s not the first time Barrett has been nominated for AFSEC. In 2003, she was nominated by President George W. Bush, but eventually withdrew her name before going the confirmation process. She was later confirmed as Bush’s ambassador to Finland. (Source: Air Force Times 05/21/19)