U.S. service members transitioning out of the military will now be able to access ChatGPT Plus for a year under a new offer from OpenAI that’s aimed at helping them with their job hunt. The new offer, announced Monday ahead of Veterans Day, is available to service members who are within 12 months of separation or retirement, and any veteran within their first year of leaving service. Katrina Mulligan, OpenAI for Government’s head of national security partnerships, said on a call with reporters ahead of the announcement. “We know that nearly 70% of veterans say finding employment is their biggest challenge, and we want to make that transition a little bit easier by providing support that’s available anytime.” Mulligan said the idea for the offer started with OpenAI’s own veteran employees who used the platform for their own career navigation. “They urged us to make these tools available to others going through the same experience, and we were really glad to support it,” she said.Through the new offer, eligible service members and veterans are able to access ChatGPT Plus — which is typically a $20 per month subscription, and boasts faster response time as well as priority access to new features — as well as some personalized content for veterans. That includes a “getting started” video targeted toward veterans, and over 100 example chats that Mulligan said were developed by veterans based on real tasks during a transition. The offer is not a direct partnership with the U.S. government via the Department of Veterans Affairs or Department of Defense — which the Trump administration calls the Department of War — but such collaboration isn’t out of the question.
The Department of Energy officially installed Dawn Zimmer as its chief information officer Friday, putting a pause — for now — on the revolving door at the agency’s IT leadership office. According to an internal email obtained by FedScoop, Energy Secretary Chris Wright announced that Zimmer had been named Energy’s permanent CIO. Her appointment comes after the installation — and subsequent departures — of two other permanent CIOs during the Trump administration. Zimmer joined Energy in 2024 as principal deputy CIO and has been serving as the acting IT chief between the appointments of permanent officials throughout this year. She was acting CIO before SpaceX engineer Ryan Riedel was named to the role and briefly took over in an acting capacity again when he left after one month. Days later, Google and Twitter alum Ross Graber was named CIO, but he left after less than two months in the role. That has left the agency without a permanent official since the end of April. Wright said in the email that “Dawn will continue her stellar oversight of the Department’s information technology and cybersecurity initiatives, ensuring that our systems are secure, efficient, and innovative.”
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U.S. service members transitioning out of the military will now be able to access ChatGPT Plus for a year under a new offer from OpenAI that’s aimed at helping them with their job hunt. The new offer, announced Monday ahead of Veterans Day, is available to service members who are within 12 months of separation or retirement, and any veteran within their first year of leaving service. Katrina Mulligan, OpenAI for Government’s head of national security partnerships, said on a call with reporters ahead of the announcement. “We know that nearly 70% of veterans say finding employment is their biggest challenge, and we want to make that transition a little bit easier by providing support that’s available anytime.” Mulligan said the idea for the offer started with OpenAI’s own veteran employees who used the platform for their own career navigation. “They urged us to make these tools available to others going through the same experience, and we were really glad to support it,” she said.Through the new offer, eligible service members and veterans are able to access ChatGPT Plus — which is typically a $20 per month subscription, and boasts faster response time as well as priority access to new features — as well as some personalized content for veterans. That includes a “getting started” video targeted toward veterans, and over 100 example chats that Mulligan said were developed by veterans based on real tasks during a transition. The offer is not a direct partnership with the U.S. government via the Department of Veterans Affairs or Department of Defense — which the Trump administration calls the Department of War — but such collaboration isn’t out of the question.
The Department of Energy officially installed Dawn Zimmer as its chief information officer Friday, putting a pause — for now — on the revolving door at the agency’s IT leadership office. According to an internal email obtained by FedScoop, Energy Secretary Chris Wright announced that Zimmer had been named Energy’s permanent CIO. Her appointment comes after the installation — and subsequent departures — of two other permanent CIOs during the Trump administration. Zimmer joined Energy in 2024 as principal deputy CIO and has been serving as the acting IT chief between the appointments of permanent officials throughout this year. She was acting CIO before SpaceX engineer Ryan Riedel was named to the role and briefly took over in an acting capacity again when he left after one month. Days later, Google and Twitter alum Ross Graber was named CIO, but he left after less than two months in the role. That has left the agency without a permanent official since the end of April. Wright said in the email that “Dawn will continue her stellar oversight of the Department’s information technology and cybersecurity initiatives, ensuring that our systems are secure, efficient, and innovative.”
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The federal government shuts down; Takeaways from Hegseth’s meeting with the military’s top brass
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4 minutes 34 seconds
1 month ago
The federal government shuts down; Takeaways from Hegseth’s meeting with the military’s top brass
It’s Oct. 1 and Congress has failed to pass appropriations for fiscal year 2026. And you know what that means: the federal government has shut down. For the first time since 2019, also during a Trump administration, federal appropriations have lapsed, resulting in furloughs for hundreds of thousands of federal employees and contractors and the halting of many agency operations. Only “excepted employees” and federal workers who are “exempt” from furlough may perform work until the current lapse in appropriations is over. Though Washington has experienced a number of shutdowns and shutdown threats in recent memory, the politically combative climate surrounding this one is much more amplified. The Trump administration has already threatened to use the shutdown to permanently cut jobs that aren’t aligned with the president’s agenda. And so far, neither party seems willing to budge, with many pundits speculating the lapse could drag on long-term without an agreement between Republicans — who control both houses in Congress and the White House — and Democrats. But one thing is clear: Until that agreement is reached, many of the federal government’s most important missions will operate at less than full capacity, including in areas like cybersecurity. FedScoop will keep you informed as the battle around the shutdown continues.
The Trump administration’s sweeping U.S. military shakeup is expected to gain momentum in the months to come — with more leadership changes, major acquisition updates and possible personnel cuts in the Pentagon’s pipeline, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth suggested during an unusual gathering of military brass Tuesday. At the “key leaders all-call” meeting with hundreds of top generals and admirals summoned from around the world at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Hegseth and President Donald Trump unveiled a broad docket of new and forthcoming directives meant to reflect their overarching vision for “woke”-ending reforms. Trump said: “We will not be politically correct when it comes to defending American freedom. We will be a fighting and winning machine. We want to fight, we want to win, and we want to fight as little as possible.” Theories swirled about the intent behind this mass gathering after Hegseth hastily ordered it last week. In the portion that was publicly livestreamed, Hegseth outlined his plans for policy shifts — via 10 directives — around physical fitness and grooming standards, mandatory training, oversight processes, records retention rules and more.
The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon.
If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.
The Daily Scoop Podcast
U.S. service members transitioning out of the military will now be able to access ChatGPT Plus for a year under a new offer from OpenAI that’s aimed at helping them with their job hunt. The new offer, announced Monday ahead of Veterans Day, is available to service members who are within 12 months of separation or retirement, and any veteran within their first year of leaving service. Katrina Mulligan, OpenAI for Government’s head of national security partnerships, said on a call with reporters ahead of the announcement. “We know that nearly 70% of veterans say finding employment is their biggest challenge, and we want to make that transition a little bit easier by providing support that’s available anytime.” Mulligan said the idea for the offer started with OpenAI’s own veteran employees who used the platform for their own career navigation. “They urged us to make these tools available to others going through the same experience, and we were really glad to support it,” she said.Through the new offer, eligible service members and veterans are able to access ChatGPT Plus — which is typically a $20 per month subscription, and boasts faster response time as well as priority access to new features — as well as some personalized content for veterans. That includes a “getting started” video targeted toward veterans, and over 100 example chats that Mulligan said were developed by veterans based on real tasks during a transition. The offer is not a direct partnership with the U.S. government via the Department of Veterans Affairs or Department of Defense — which the Trump administration calls the Department of War — but such collaboration isn’t out of the question.
The Department of Energy officially installed Dawn Zimmer as its chief information officer Friday, putting a pause — for now — on the revolving door at the agency’s IT leadership office. According to an internal email obtained by FedScoop, Energy Secretary Chris Wright announced that Zimmer had been named Energy’s permanent CIO. Her appointment comes after the installation — and subsequent departures — of two other permanent CIOs during the Trump administration. Zimmer joined Energy in 2024 as principal deputy CIO and has been serving as the acting IT chief between the appointments of permanent officials throughout this year. She was acting CIO before SpaceX engineer Ryan Riedel was named to the role and briefly took over in an acting capacity again when he left after one month. Days later, Google and Twitter alum Ross Graber was named CIO, but he left after less than two months in the role. That has left the agency without a permanent official since the end of April. Wright said in the email that “Dawn will continue her stellar oversight of the Department’s information technology and cybersecurity initiatives, ensuring that our systems are secure, efficient, and innovative.”
The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon.
If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.
