Jacob Braun

Jacob (Jake) Braun is Executive Director of the Harris School of Public Policy Cyber Policy Initiative. Mr. Braun previously served as acting Principal Deputy National Cyber Director in the White House from May 2023 to July 2024.  Prior to that, he was Senior Counselor for Transformation to the Secretary of Homeland Security.  Mr. Braun was initially appointed by President Joseph Biden as Senior Advisor to the Department of Homeland Security’s Management Directorate in February 2021. He is also a lecturer at the Harris School of Public Policy. Mr. Braun is the author of Democracy in Danger: How Hackers and Activists Exposed Fatal Flaws in the Election System and has co-authored three award-winning and seminal works on election infrastructure cyber vulnerabilities. He has worked extensively on national security and finance issues throughout the U.S., Europe, Asia, Africa, Middle East and Latin America.

Mr. Braun was Chief Executive Officer of Cambridge Global Advisors from 2013 to 2021.  He assisted clients in the management, development, and implementation of their national security programs, practices, and policies. 

Prior to joining the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy faculty and Cambridge Global Advisors, Mr. Braun was appointed by President Barack Obama as Director of White House and Public Liaison to the Department of Homeland Security where he oversaw some of the most high-profile public engagements executed at DHS. He was instrumental in the effort to gain passage in the European Parliament of the largest data sharing agreement between the United States and the European Union. In addition, he designed and implemented a program to modernize the DHS cybersecurity workforce. Mr. Braun also oversaw stakeholder crisis communications for the White House during the 2010 Deep Water Horizon Gulf Oil Spill.

Before his tenure as White House Liaison, Mr. Braun served on the Presidential Transition Team for the Obama Administration as Deputy Director for the National Security Agencies Review. In this capacity he oversaw agency review programs for all national security agencies including the State Department, DOD, DHS, CIA, USAID, etc. and guided policy assessments from their inception to the then-President-Elect’s desk.

Mr. Braun is co-founder of the DEF CON Voting Machine Hacking Village, and in the President’s Circle on the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. 

Mr. Braun began his career as a journalist for newspapers in Illinois and Taiwan. He holds an MA in International Relations from Troy St. University, an MA in Education from National-Louis University in Chicago, and a BA in Philosophy from Loyola University of Chicago.