Last week, I had the privilege of speaking with thousands of cybersecurity practitioners and stakeholders at the 2013 RSA Conference USA in San Francisco, CA.  

The conference was an ideal venue for discussing the President’s new Executive Order on Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity (E.O. 13636) that was announced in this year’s State of the Union address. The E.O. will be the catalyst for a variety of new initiatives to develop cybersecurity standards, improve public-private information sharing, and ensure privacy and civil liberties protections.  With so many cybersecurity professionals in one place, I and several senior leaders from the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Commerce were able to provide in-depth explanations of the E.O., answer questions on its implementation, and engage with industry partners on how they can help. 

Ed. note: This article by Valerie Jarrett was first published on the Huffington Post. You can read it here. On Friday, March 8th at 3:45 p.m. ET, Valerie Jarrett, Senior Advisor to the President and Chair of the White House Council on Women and Girls, will participate in a session of White House Office Hours to answers your questions about the Violence Against Women Act on Twitter. Ask questions now with #WHChat, and then follow the Q&A live.

Today, President Obama signed a bill that both strengthened and reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA).  Thanks to this bipartisan agreement, thousands of women and men across the country who are victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence and stalking will be able to access resources they need in their communities to help heal from their trauma. In addition, thousands of law enforcement officers will be better equipped to stop violence before it starts, and respond to calls of help when they are needed.

President Obama and Vice President Biden have steadfastly supported reauthorization—it’s what’s right for our country. We thank Senators Patrick Leahy, Mike Crapo, and Patty Murray and Representatives Nancy Pelosi, Steny Hoyer and Gwen Moore for guiding this legislation to passage.

For the past 18 years, since Vice President Biden initially wrote the Act in 1994, VAWA has helped to decrease the rates of domestic violence across the country. Three years ago, our federal interagency group on violence against women began meeting to consider gaps in our country’s response to this violence and make recommendations to Congress to fill those gaps. We are proud that many of these recommendations were included in the final bill. Now, we will be better equipped to recognize violence in its early stages, and help to reduce the number of domestic violence homicides.

(by USAID)

Editor’s Note:  On March 7, Deputy Secretary of State Bill Burns led the U.S. delegation to the Friends of Yemen ministerial meeting in London, United Kingdom. This meeting reaffirmed the international community’s continued support for the people of Yemen during their historic transition process, including the upcoming National Dialogue and, ultimately, national elections in early 2014.  The United States is committed to the Friends of Yemen process and its goal of supporting Yemen as it endeavors to achieve meaningful political, economic, and security sector reform. As part of this commitment, Rashad Hussain, Special Envoy to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, recently traveled to Yemen.

As a part of our on-going efforts to deepen and expand partnerships with Muslim communities around the world, I recently visited Sana'a, Yemen. I heard first-hand from Yemeni government officials, civil society, and religious leaders about a variety of issues, including the country’s political transition and National Dialogue, U.S.-Yemen cooperation, and U.S. engagement with Muslim communities around the world. I was impressed by the passion and optimism of Yemen’s vibrant civil society, and by the determination and sincerity of its people. There is so much more happening in Yemen than what is conveyed in news headlines that I wanted to share some of my observations.
 
Just before my arrival, the government announced that the National Dialogue would officially begin on March 18. I spoke with a broad array of civil society activists about their goals and concerns about the National Dialogue.  I encouraged the full and active participation of all parts of Yemeni society in the National Dialogue, and highlighted the important role that civil society plays in ensuring the Dialogue’s success. 

Post World War II, military veterans returned home to a community of veterans and a grateful nation that had shared in the sacrifice of war. These veterans used the brick and mortar posts of the American Legion and the VFW to maintain that esprit-de-corps. They mentored youth, advocated on veterans issues, shared war stories, and confided in each other over beers.

President Barack Obama greets members of the Team Rubicon disaster relief organization in the Oval Office, Feb. 8, 2013. Participants include: Danielle Harrington, volunteer; James "JC" McGreehan, Mission Leader; William McNulty, Vice President and co-founder; Daniel Nidess, Director of Personnel; Matt Pelak, Director of Strategic Partnerships; Andrew Stevens, Director of Programs; Maria Lourdes Tiglao, Regional Director of Recruitment; and Jacob Wood, President and co-founder. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

For generations, when veterans took off their uniform, their desire to serve did not end. That’s just as true today. Some very creative post 9/ll veterans’ charities have adapted to this desire and have created models for continued service and engagement. The Mission Continues provides fellowships for returning veterans to continue their service in the public sector. Ride 2 Recovery and Team RWB use the therapeutic effect of physical training to repair the physical and mental wounds of war. Our organization, Team Rubicon, uses continued service through disaster response as a means to maintain purpose, community, and a sense-of-self. Our work is inspired by our late friend Clay Hunt, who took his own life after leaving the service.

Ed note: The information on this graphic was updated on March 4, 2013

In his briefing today, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney talked about Caitlin Halligan, who was nominated by President Obama to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Ms. Halligan, who has bipartisan support from lawyers and law enforcement, was put forward for this position in 2011.  

Mr. Carney said there will be a cloture vote on the nomination of Caitlin Halligan tomorrow, 726 days after her nomination, and strongly urged the Senate to support an up-or-down vote for this well-qualified nominee. "When Republicans filibustered her nomination in 2011, several of them hung their objections – not on her qualifications or her judicial philosophy – but on the DC Circuit workload. In essence, they didn’t object to her as a judge, just that the seat did not need to be filled. But since then, there has been an additional vacancy, leaving the court with four vacancies (36 percent vacant) – in fact, the court has never been this understaffed in history, with 188 cases pending."

Ms. Halligan is not President Obama's only judicial nominee suffering endless delays for a vote. As the infographic below highlights:

• 78 percent of President Obama’s circuit court judges have waited more than 100 days for a vote, compared to 15 of President Bush’s nominees. 
• This obstruction also applies to President Obama’s district court nominees. 42 percent of our district court judges have waited more than 100 days for a vote, compared to 8 of President Bush’s nominees.
• Further, the average wait time for our judicial nominees to get a vote on the floor of the Senate – both for the circuit court and the district court – is 3-4 times as long as those of our predecessor. 

We announced last week that we are doing a self-assessment of the U.S. National Action Plan on Open Government and were looking for your feedback about our implementation. We are meeting with civil society groups to solicit their feedback in person, and we set up ways for you to share your own feedback online through a dedicated Q&A site Quora, or through a web form on WhiteHouse.gov. And we take your feedback seriously. 

Here’s proof: We heard from you that it would be helpful if we published the text of the President's directive extending whistleblower protections to the intelligence and national security communities for the first time. We decided you were right. Click here to find the directive.

President Barack Obama holds a Cabinet meeting in the Cabinet Room of the White House, March 4, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

President Obama today welcomed two new members to his Cabinet, as he held the 17th Cabinet meeting of his Presidency, and the first in 2013. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, the former White House Chief of Staff and OMB Director, and Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, a former Senator from Nebraska, joined the President and other Cabinet members in the West Wing to discuss the potential impact of the sequester on all the agencies and missions, and ways to minimize the impacts on American families.

But the President made clear that while budget issues are a deep concern, he has confidence in the Cabinet leadership to steer all government agencies in making the best possible decisions to help American families. In his remarks before the meeting, President Obama laid out the other topics that were on his agenda -- growing the economy and helping families thrive:

We’re going to have the opportunity to talk about initiatives like early childhood education that can have an enormous impact on our kids and, ultimately, our growth and productivity. We’ll have a chance to hear from Joe and other members of the Cabinet about progress in reducing gun violence in this country.

So one of the things that I’ve instructed not just my White House but every agency is to make sure that, regardless of some of the challenges that they may face because of sequestration, we’re not going to stop working on behalf of the American people to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to continue to grow this economy and improve people’s prospects.

President Barack Obama announces the nominations of, from left, Ernest Moniz as Energy Secretary, Gina McCarthy as Environmental Protection Agency Administrator, and Sylvia Mathews Burwell as Director of the Office of Management and Budget, in the East Room of the White House, March 4, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson)

Today, President Obama announced his nominees for director of the Office of Management and Budget, Secretary of Energy and administrator of the EPA.

Sylvia Matthews Burwell, the President's pick for Office of Management and Budget Director, is an expert on budgetary and domestic policy. She served as Deputy Director of the OMB from 1998 to 2001, as well as Deputy Chief of Staff to the President and Chief of Staff to the Secretary of the Treasury during the Clinton administration.

President Obama said that Burwell "understands that our goal when we put together a budget is not just to make the numbers add up. Our goal is also to reignite the true engine of economic growth in this country, and that is a strong and growing middle class -- to offer ladders of opportunity for anybody willing to climb them."

On February 22nd, we welcomed twenty one programmers and tech experts to the White House and invited them to spend the day working alongside seven members of our own development team. Their goal was simple: to build tools using the new API for We the People, the White House petitions system, and contribute example code to a software development kit (SDK). For nine hours, these two groups clustered around each other's laptops, solving problems, sharing ideas, sharing code, and asking questions. 

This was the first White House Open Data Day Hackathon.