Admiral Lisa Franchetti, a former head of the US 6th Fleet and US naval forces in South Korea, has been nominated by President Joe Biden to lead the US Navy, the first time a woman has been nominated to head a Pentagon military service branch.
The BBC reports that Admiral Franchetti, a 38-year veteran, is a former head of the US 6th Fleet and US naval forces in South Korea, and has also served as an aircraft carrier strike commander. She was only the second woman to achieve the rank of four-star admiral.
Biden’s nomination must still be confirmed by the US Senate. The BBC reports that one conservative lawmaker – Alabama Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville – is currently blocking the Senate from confirming military leaders as a gesture of protest against military abortion policy. (Tuberville is against a Pentagon policy that pays the travel expenses of service members who have to go out of state to have an abortion.)
If confirmed as Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Franchetti will be the first woman to become a member of the elite group of senior military officers who make up the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The BBC notes that the US Coast Guard is currently led by a woman – Admiral Linda Fagan – but that military branch falls under the Department of Homeland Security rather than the Department of Defense.
[Image: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisa_Franchetti#/media/File:ADM_Lisa_M._Franchetti_(2).jpg]