- The White House has forwarded three Navy nominations to the Senate for confirmation
- Cao currently serves as acting Navy secretary while Toti performs the duties of under secretary
- Breckenridge and Toti each bring decades of Navy and defense industry experience
Earlier this month, President Donald Trump nominated Cao for the Navy secretary role. The White House said Monday the president also nominated Toti for the under secretary role and Breckenridge for the assistant secretary post.
Who Is Hung Cao?
Cao is a retired U.S. Navy captain and a 2026 Wash100 Award popular vote winner who has served as acting Navy secretary since April. He was confirmed as under secretary of the Navy in October 2025.
Before returning to government, Cao worked in the private sector as a vice president and client executive at CACI International, where his portfolio covered electronic warfare, counter-drone technology and enterprise IT support for defense clients.
Across 25 years in the Navy, Cao held a range of leadership posts, including division chief at the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and commanding officer of the Naval Diving and Salvage Training Center. He also served as a special operations and explosive ordnance disposal officer, directing underwater missions and counter-improvised threat operations during deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia.
He identified sailor and Marine readiness, shipbuilding and homeland defense as his top priorities in his first address as acting secretary and has since worked to advance that agenda, including signing the Navy’s data and artificial intelligence weaponization strategy and establishing a new portfolio manager office for robotic and autonomous systems. He has also drawn attention for consolidating networks and driving a faster-paced modernization approach across the department. During his keynote speech at the 2026 Navy Summit, he rallied industry around faster acquisition and shipbuilding mobilization.
Who Is William Toti?
Toti is a retired Navy captain and career submariner who most recently served as senior adviser to Deputy Secretary of War Steve Feinberg, advising him on submarine construction matters. In May, Cao appointed Toti, a previous Wash100 awardee, to perform the duties of the under secretary of the Navy.
He brings more than four decades of defense experience, including 26 years of active-duty service in the Navy.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Toti previously served as CEO of Sparton and president of the integrated maritime systems sector at L3 Technologies. He also held leadership roles at DXC Technology, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Cubic and Raytheon.
Who Is Richard Breckenridge?
Breckenridge is a retired Navy vice admiral who served for more than 30 years in a variety of operational and leadership roles. The Navy appointed Breckenridge as senior adviser for shipbuilding in June to support the Golden Fleet initiative and help streamline acquisition processes.
During his military career, he held senior positions including deputy commander of U.S. Fleet Forces Command, director of the Undersea Warfare Division, chief of staff for the Joint Staff’s J8 directorate and director of warfare integration. His operational assignments included command of USS Memphis during Operation Iraqi Freedom, commodore of Submarine Squadron 4 and commander of Submarine Group 2.
After leaving the Navy, Breckenridge joined Northrop Grumman, where he served as vice president of strategy and business development at the company’s aeronautics systems business.
Breckenridge is a U.S. Naval Academy aerospace engineering graduate who earned master’s degrees in engineering acoustics and electrical engineering from the Naval Postgraduate School.
