Usually when there is a nomination to the FCC the individual nominated is at least somewhat within the Czar’s orbit.

Truthfully, Ms. Trusty is not. Other than being connected on LinkedIn–not even sure how that happened– I don’t recall running across Ms. Trusty, but her career as a Congressional staffer appears to have been quite impactful (impressive.)

Some quick notes about her background.

She’s an athlete–love that– and was a member of the Tar Heels gymnastics team back in the early 2000s. (She was even the “Gymnast of the Week” back in January, 2004.)

Her passion for athletics undoubtedly lead her to assist with the EMPOWERING OLYMPIC AND AMATEUR ATHLETES ACT OF 2019, where she had a significant role assisting Senator Wicker in moving the bill forward. The bill arose following the conviction of Dr. Nassar who had abused Olympians, and resulted in 18 months of interviews with athlete survivors and 4 subcommittee hearings before the law emerged.

Nearer and dearer to TCPAWorld reader’s hearts–Trusty was on the team that developed the Traced Act.

As we reported a while back, Senator Thune–who is credited as one of the chief architects of the Traced Act–is now the ranking Republican in the Senate. I do not view it as a coincidence that Trusty now finds herself headed to the FCC after helping to craft that statute–which is easily the most impactful telecom law to pass in a decade.

In the words of Thune himself, Ms. Trusty “worked tirelessly to help develop and advance [the TRACED Act.]”

So.. yeah. Trusty knows her way around the TCPA.

And that is no surprise since she was the Republican policy director for the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee Communications, Media and Broadband Subcommittee (Jan. 2019- Dec. 2022). That’s just the Subcommittee with jurisdiction over all sectors of communications phone calls and the internet.

And then before that was a senior consultant in Verizon’s Government Relations team and a Senior Policy Representative for Qwest Communications.

So… yeah.

Trusty feels like a no-brainer. But there’s even more to her background that is interesting.

Check out this bullet point on her resume:

• Senate Armed Services Committee Cybersecurity Subcommittee (Jan. 2023-), Staff Lead, Republican

Yeah. She helped lead the subcomittee on cybersecurity. And now she’s teaming up with Chairman Carr who has stated a key focus of the FCC should be national security. (I wonder how she’s going to feel about foreign-owned TCR collecting all that data about American text practices?)

And no surprise, Trusty also had a hand in crafting the National Defense Authorization Act, addressing a broad range of issues, from strategic competition with China and Russia to countering threats to Iran, North Korea and violent extremists. Most importantly, the bill authorized record level investments in key technologies– including artificial intelligence.

Trusty is also exceptionally well traveled. According to the Congressional Foreign Travel Financial Reports Ms. Trusty has visited Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, Argentina, Chile, Egypt, Jordan, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Israel in just the last couple of years–probably in furtherance of her efforts supporting the Senate Armed Services committee.

So yeah.

Trusty Trusty (as you can expect to hear me call her from now on) is a VERY solid candidate. But also the sort of institutionalist I am surprised (but glad) Trump went with.

I am impressed. Top to bottom. Look forward to working with her office– assuming she is formally nominated and approved, which seems very likely given her background and the Senate composition.

(Special thanks to our new clerk Gabby for the great investigation work here– nice job!)