Senate confirms Biden's pick to lead NARA

The Senate voted 52-45 on Wednesday to confirm President Biden’s nominee to take the helm of the National Archives and Records Administration. 

Colleen Shogan was most recently a senior vice president and director at the White House Historical Association and previously worked at the Library of Congress and Congressional Research Service. She was also a professor at George Mason University and wrote a series of mystery novels.

“As an accomplished political scientist who has held nonpartisan leadership roles throughout her career, Dr. Shogan is well qualified to lead the National Archives,” Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said on the Senate floor on Wednesday. “Throughout multiple Congresses and presidential administrations, in both parties, Dr. Shogan has demonstrated a strong commitment to serving the American people with nonpartisan integrity.”

The American Political Science Association, Council of State Archivists, American Historical Association and other groups backed her nomination. 

During her confirmation hearing back in February, Shogan said that if confirmed, her priorities would include reducing the backlog of over 300,000 veterans’ records requests and looking for opportunities to declassify older records. Records management and classification have been hot-button issues recently. 

After her first confirmation hearing in September, the committee failed to advance her nomination to the full Senate after Republicans accused her of being extremely partisan. Three Republicans joined the Democrats in voting for her on Wednesday. 

Shogan is the first woman to hold this role.