Trump Put the Army's Civil Works Chief in Charge of the Whole Army. He Has Been in the Job 13 Months.
Adam Telle, who until Friday handled flood control and Clean Water Act permitting, becomes acting Army secretary after Dan Driscoll resigned amid reported friction with Pete Hegseth.
President Donald Trump named Adam Telle acting secretary of the Army on September 4, elevating a political operative who has spent the last year running the service's civil works portfolio into the top civilian job at the nation's largest military branch.
Telle's current post — assistant secretary of the Army for civil works — is one of the more unusual jobs in the Pentagon. It has almost nothing to do with combat. The office oversees the Army Corps of Engineers' non-military work: commercial navigation on the inland waterways, flood control projects, and permitting under the Clean Water Act. Telle took that job in August 2025, which means he has been inside the Department of the Army for roughly 13 months.
His resume before that is congressional, not military. Telle spent more than two decades in Republican politics and government, serving as chief of staff to Senator Bill Hagerty of Tennessee from 2021 to 2025, and before that as a White House liaison to the Senate for 18 months during Trump's first term. He worked for the late Senator Thad Cochran of Mississippi for a decade and was the chief staff member on the Senate Appropriations Committee's Homeland Security Subcommittee — a background heavy on money and process.
He replaces Dan Driscoll, who resigned after months of reported tension with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Several officials seen as Driscoll allies were pushed out over the same period, including General Randy George, the Army's top uniformed leader. The turnover at the top of the Army has now touched both the civilian and uniformed chains of command inside a single year.
Trump announced the appointment with a short endorsement, calling Telle "a Great Patriot, who is respected by all." Hegseth added his own note, describing Telle as "Strong and whip smart" and predicting he "will be an immediate asset to the @USArmy."
The timing is what makes the appointment consequential rather than routine. Telle inherits the service during an active conflict with Iran and a substantially enlarged American force posture across the Middle East. The Army is also carrying documented shortfalls in critical missile defense systems — the interceptors that protect deployed troops and partner nations from exactly the kind of fire that a Middle East war generates.
Acting secretaries operate without Senate confirmation, which lets an administration fill a vacancy quickly and skips the public hearing at which senators would normally press a nominee on those shortfalls. Telle's years on Capitol Hill mean he knows how that process works from the other side of the table. Whether the White House will eventually send his name to the Senate for the permanent job has not been announced.
Originally reported by NBC News.