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1998 Wharton MBA graduate Brandon Williams was tapped to lead the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (Photo from Congress).

1998 Wharton MBA graduate and former Rep. Brandon Williams (R-N.Y.) was tapped by 1968 Wharton graduate and President Donald Trump to lead the National Nuclear Security Administration.

Williams, a former Navy officer, was elected to the United States House of Representatives during the 2022 midterm elections to represent New York’s 22nd Congressional District, which includes Syracuse, N.Y., and Utica, N.Y. He was unseated by a Democrat in the November 2024 election. 

Trump announced his decision in a post on his social media app Truth Social.

“Brandon is a successful businessman and Veteran of the United States Navy, where he served as a Nuclear Submarine Officer, and Strategic Missile officer,” Trump wrote. 

Williams went through a two-year training program at the Naval Nuclear Power Training Command, which taught him how to operate the nuclear reactors that power submarines and aircraft carriers, as NBC News reports. Only 3,000 of the top-scoring applicants gain acceptance into the program each year, offering career advancement perks in the civilian and naval world and significant monetary bonuses.

Established in 2000, the NNSA works within the U.S. Department of Energy. It is tasked with managing the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, providing the Navy with nuclear reactors and to regulate the reliability and safety operation of the plants, and promoting international nuclear safety. 

“[Williams] will be facing an incredibly complex, technical job,” Hans Kristensen, the director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists told The New York Times

After graduating with an MBA from the Wharton School, Williams co-founded the startup funding company IgniteIP. He later founded and served as CEO of the industrial process software company CPLANE.ai.

As a representative, Williams voted along party lines and was a vocal supporter of Trump. He was a member of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce that posed questions to former Penn President Liz Magill and two other university presidents about Jewish student safety, following the start of the Israel-Hamas war.