White House taps a new chief statistician

The White House has a new chief statistician following Mark Calabria’s exit from the role this week, according to a source with direct knowledge and a federal website.

Office of Management and Budget’s Stuart Levenbach is the new top statistical official, the source, who was granted anonymity to be more candid, told FedScoop. The federal statistical website StatsPolicy.gov also lists Levenbach as chair of the Interagency Council on Statistical Policy (ICSP) — a role that, by law, is held by the chief statistician.

White House spokespeople did not respond to a FedScoop request for comment.

The change-up makes Levenbach the third person to serve in the role under Trump. Karin Orvis, who had served in the role since 2022, was the first. She was swapped out for Calabria in July, but stayed within OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, leading stats and science policy.

Levenbach is a marine ecologist by training and oversees natural resources, energy, science and water issues at OMB. Notably, he was recently President Donald Trump’s nominee to head up the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, though it was widely understood that nomination was not made in earnest. 

A CFPB official told Politico at the time that his nomination was “technical” and intended to provide OMB Director Russell Vought more time as acting head of the consumer protection agency. Levenbach’s nomination ended earlier this month after it lapsed at the start of the new Senate session. 

Before his roles in the current administration, Levenbach served in various public and private sector roles, including in Trump’s first term.

Between the first and second Trump administrations, Levenbach led government affairs at the energy technology company Baker Hughes and operated his own advisory business, per his LinkedIn profile.

During the first Trump administration, he was a senior advisor on the National Economic Council and chief of staff at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, per a February White House announcement about his other OMB role. He had previously worked for OMB for a decade as program examiner in its Resource Management Office Commerce Branch and as a senior policy analyst in the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs’ Natural Resources and Environment Branch. 

Levenbach has a Ph.D. from the University of California, Santa Barbara in marine ecology, per his bio from the White House.