Based in Washington, Jen managed Aviation Week’s worldwide defense, space and security coverage from 2013 to January 2024.
Prior to taking on the Executive Editor role, Jen was Aviation Week's Congressional Editor. Jen came to Aviation Week in March 2011 from Politico, where she covered the intersection of defense and politics. She also worked as a reporter and editor for Defense Daily, Inside the Army, The Other Paper and The Columbus Dispatch.
Jen received a Master’s degree in journalism as a Kiplinger Fellow at the Ohio State University. She graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in history and journalism from the University of Michigan.
Despite a call for budget cuts, the U.S. intelligence community’s budget for fiscal 2013 was $52.6 billion, and placed a high priority on certain major acquisition programs. That classified request to Congress was a reduction of $1.3 billion from the previous year, a start toward saving $15 billion by 2017 and $25 billion over the decade, according to a report by Director of National Intelligence James Clapper that was leaked to the Washington Post by whistleblower Edward Snowden.
FURLOUGHS SHORTENED: Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has reduced furloughs for civilian Defense Department employees from 11 days to six, but that may come at the expense of weapons systems as the Pentagon continues to wrestle with budget cuts. “Hoping to be able to reduce furloughs, we submitted a large reprogramming proposal to Congress in May, asking them to let us move funds from acquisition accounts into day-to-day operating accounts,” Hagel said in announcing the changes to anticipated furloughs.
The Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee approved a $594.4 billion bill to fund the Pentagon and its wartime operations in fiscal 2014 that guts the administration’s request to purchase 20 Embraer A-29 Super Tucanos for the Afghan Air Force under the Light Air Support (LAS) program. The draft of the defense spending bill would slice $416.8 million for LAS and also remove all funding for the purchase of Mi-17 helicopters for Afghanistan.
