Navy Secretary John Phelan testifies Feb. 27, 2025, during his Senate confirmation hearing. (Eric Kayne/Stars and Stripes)
WASHINGTON — John Phelan, an investor who said he would make up for his lack of military experience with his business acumen, was confirmed Monday by the Senate to serve as Navy secretary.
Phelan, 61, was confirmed in a 62-30 vote and will become the first person in more than 15 years to lead the Navy without having served in any branch of the military. Phelan has acknowledged his inexperience but cast it as an asset.
A founder of several investment firms, Phelan said he would draw on his management and leadership skills to reform the Navy and address subpar housing, high suicide rates, failed audits and delays and cost overruns in shipbuilding and ship maintenance.
“The Navy and the Marine Corps already possess extraordinary operational expertise within their ranks,” he said. “My role is to utilize that expertise and strengthen it, step outside the status quo and take decisive action with a results-oriented approach.”
Phelan’s only connection to the military is through an advisory role for the Spirit of America, a nonprofit that works with troops and diplomats to deliver assistance to communities affected by conflict.
He was a major donor to President Donald Trump’s 2024 re-election campaign and said during his confirmation hearing last month that Trump often texts him in the middle of the night to complain about rusty warships.
Trump has made shipbuilding a focus of his second term, vowing to build commercial and military ships “very fast, very soon” to keep pace with China’s growing naval fleet and challenge its dominance in the commercial shipbuilding market.
China’s estimated 400-ship navy is already the largest in the world while the U.S. Navy’s plan to have a fleet of 315 ships by 2025 has fallen short, with the service having 296 battle-force ships as of January, according to the Congressional Research Service.
Phelan told senators that he believed the Navy was suffering from a culture of complacency and failing to take decisive action to address shipbuilding problems.
“It’s almost as if we’re waiting for a crisis to happen to ignite things and I think in the business of warfare, that’s a dangerous place to be,” he said. “I would bring a sense of urgency to this. I would bring a sense of accountability to this.”
Phelan also committed to passing a department-wide audit and growing the Navy’s enlisted ranks. The Navy is on track to meet its recruiting goals for the second straight year, but it has also started accepting lower test scores and recruits without high school diplomas or GED certificates.
Phelan said he would apply best practices from the Marine Corps, which has consistently met its recruiting goals, and his own experience attracting and retaining talent to improve enlistment numbers.
Republican Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he considered Phelan’s nontraditional background an asset and was pleased with his track record in business.
“He has rescued companies in distress,” Wicker said. “Our Navy is certainly in distress and we need that same kind of leadership.”
Some Democrats were less fond of Phelan’s business background.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., raised concerns about Phelan’s investments in defense contractors and pressed him in a letter this month to avoid any conflicts of interest while serving as Navy secretary and for at least four years after.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., said she would withhold her support for Phelan due to fears that planned cuts to the Defense Department’s civilian workforce would affect shipyard workers.
Phelan during his confirmation hearing promised to sit down with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to protect shipyards from any negative impacts of the mass layoffs, calling the workers there “critical.”
