Trump appoints CIA's second female director

Trump appoints CIA’s second female director

Before Gina Haspel, Meroe Park was the Agency’s Acting Director for three days in 2017

Written by
Edited by Michael Morisy

Earlier today, President Donald Trump announced he would replace Secretary of State Rex Tillerson with Central Intelligence Agency Director Mike Pompeo. In Pompeo’s place, Trump appointed Deputy Director Gina Haspel, and many outlets reported that would make her the first person to hold that position.

However, Haspel is technically the second: former Executive Director Meroe Park was the Agency’s Acting Director for three days in 2017, and was in fact the DCI when Trump first visited the Agency’s headquarters.

The CIA has long struggled with the issue of gender equality. A series of memos discovered by Emma Best in CREST show the Agency’s resistance to change, while a recruitment campaign from 2015 released to Runa Sandvik feared women were “intimidated by the aloof, secretive nature of the CIA.”

Browse our timeline of CIA history, including all the directors past and present, below.


Image via C-Span