Exclusive: House cyber lawmakers plan Silicon Valley hearing
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The House Homeland Security Committee is planning a field hearing on cybersecurity issues in Silicon Valley during the congressional recess next week, Axios has learned.
Why it matters: Tensions between Washington and the cybersecurity industry have been high amid DOGE-led cuts at the nation's top cyber agency and growing concerns about nation-state cyber threats against critical infrastructure, particularly during a global trade war.
Driving the news: Congress is also weighing the reauthorization of the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, which expires at the end of the year.
- Without it, industry argues they'll no longer have the legal safeguards needed to trade vital cyber threat information with the government or each other.
Zoom in: The House Homeland Security Committee will hold a hearing at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University next Wednesday focused on the U.S. cybersecurity posture, a spokesperson shared exclusively with Axios.
- Chair Mark Green (R-Tenn.), ranking member Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and cyber subcommittee leaders Rep. Andrew Garbarino (R-N.Y.) and Eric Swalwell (D-Calif) will travel for the hearing.
- Witnesses include H.R. McMaster, former national security adviser in the first Trump White House and a fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution; Wendi Whitmore, chief security intelligence officer of Palo Alto Networks' Unit 42 threat intelligence team; and Jeanette Manfra, global director for security and compliance in Google Cloud's Office of the CISO.
- The committee will also hold private breakout discussions with lawmakers, cybersecurity stakeholders and researchers that same day, per the spokesperson.
What they're saying: Green said in a statement to Axios that the committee is heading to Silicon Vally to hear directly form "innovators, job creators and academics" about the best ways to shore up the country's cyber defenses.
- "We must work together to flip the economic models of cybersecurity, deter malicious actors, bolster and better equip our cyber defenders, and find ways to harmonize the federal government's burdensome cyber regulatory regime," Green said.
- Thompson said he was "looking forward to hearing from companies on their turf to talk about how the government can promote and benefit from tech innovation."
- Swalwell said the trip was an opportunity to discuss "innovative cybersecurity solutions," and described Silicon Valley as the "epicenter of cybersecurity research and innovation."
Go deeper: Cybersecurity's uneasy marriage with Washington gets tested by Trump
