American president Joe Biden has nominated Viquar Ahmad for Assistant Secretary for Administration and Chief Financial Officer at the Department of Commerce. If his nomination gets confirmed, Ahmad would be one of the highest-ranking Muslim Americans in the Biden-Harris administration.
Ahmed held multiple leadership roles in the U.S. government over the past two decades. Recently he served as the Deputy Chief Financial Officer of the U.S. House of Representatives over the past four years. In that role, he was responsible for the management of Congress’ operating budget.
Before that, he provided counsel to the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) senior leadership on the budget decision-making and oversight on a nearly $70 billion budget of its component agencies. “His leadership enabled DHS to successfully meet response and recovery efforts to catastrophic natural disasters, thwart cybersecurity threats, clean-up the largest maritime oil spill in U.S. history, and recapitalize critical multi-billion dollar national security assets,” said a White House press release dated August 18.
Earlier, Ahmad had served as a senior aide to the Chairman for the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies, facilitating Congress’ enactment of the largest domestic discretionary spending bills reflecting priorities outlined by a diverse constituency of stakeholders.
Ahmad has been felicitated with excellence awards, including the U.S. Coast Guard’s Distinguished Public Service Medal. Ahmed, who earned a bachelor’s degree with honours from the University of Texas at Austin, had done his master’s degree in Public Administration from George Washington University. He had been awarded an Executive Certificate in Public Leadership from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
