Trump to tap senior HUD official to run Office of Personnel Management: report

A top Housing and Urban Development (HUD) appointee and public supporter of President Trump’s 2016 campaign will reportedly be his nominee to lead the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).

Axios reported Sunday that John Gibbs, HUD’s acting Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and Development, is Trump’s top choice to lead OPM following the resignation of previous OPM chief Dale Cabaniss earlier this year.

Judd Deere, a White House spokesman, told Axios that “the White House has no personnel announcements at this time.” The White House press office did not immediately return an inquiry from The Hill.

Gibbs has served at HUD since May of 2018, leading up a program started under the Obama administration called Strong Cities and Strong Communities, which the Trump administration had largely ended upon entering power in 2017, according to The Washington Post.

The former conservative commentator made headlines the same year he joined HUD after CNN uncovered tweets he sent during the 2016 election pushing a baseless conspiracy theory alleging that Hillary Clinton, Trump’s Democratic opponent, had engaged in a Satanic ritual known as “spirit cooking.”

A bio of Gibbs on the website SiliconHarlem.net states that he worked on the first iPhone model and traveled to Japan to “train Japanese churches in social media and technology as a Christian missionary.”