Under President Donald Trump, OSTP's staff dropped from 135 to 45 people.[3] The OSTP director position remained vacant for over two years, the longest vacancy for the position since the office's founding.[4][5][4] Kelvin Droegemeier, an atmospheric scientist who previously served as the vice president of research at the University of Oklahoma, was nominated for the position on August 1, 2018[6] and confirmed by the Senate on January 2, 2019. Michael Kratsios was nominated by President Trump to be the fourth Chief Technology Officer of the United States and Associate Director of OSTP in March 2019[7] and was unanimously confirmed by the Senate on August 1, 2019.[8]