Michael Allen joined Beacon Global Strategies LLC as a Managing Director in August 2013.
Mr. Allen has spent his career in the national security arena working in the White House, Capitol Hill, and in the private sector advising on critical national security issues such as cybersecurity, non-proliferation, and intelligence matters. In addition, Mr. Allen is a frequent contributor and commentator on national security and foreign policy issues on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox.
As a Managing Director, Mr. Allen advises clients on the intersection of business and national security and helps them develop targeted Washington strategies. Michael supports client’s in understanding U.S.-China dynamics, foreign direct investment and CFIUS, national security critical technologies such as AI, as well as trade and challenges arising from geopolitical instability.
Previously, from 2011-2013, Allen served as the Majority Staff Director of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI). Under Chairman Mike Rogers’ (R-MI) direction, the HPSCI oversaw, authorized, and funded all intelligence programs in the seventeen elements of the intelligence community and led the House of Representatives’ consideration of cyber security legislation.
Prior to joining the HPSCI, Allen was director for the Bipartisan Policy Center’s successor to the 9/11 Commission, the National Security Preparedness Group, co-chaired by former Congressman Lee Hamilton and former Governor Tom Kean.
Previously, Mr. Allen served in the George W. Bush White House for seven years in a variety of national security policy and legislative roles.
At the National Security Council (NSC), he served as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Counter-proliferation Strategy from June 2007 to January 2009 under National Security Advisor Steve Hadley.
As the Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Legislative Affairs from March 2005 to June 2007, Mr. Allen was the NSC’s chief liaison with the national security committees of Congress.
From December 2001 to February 2005, Mr. Allen worked in the legislative affairs office of the White House’s Homeland Security Council. As Special Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs, Mr. Allen was part of team that managed the White House effort to enact the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, which created the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, a topic on which he later wrote Blinking Red, Crisis and Compromise in American Intelligence After 9/11 (Potomac Books, 2013).
At the beginning of the Bush Administration, Mr. Allen worked in the Bureau of Legislative Affairs at the Department of State.
In addition to his work at the Bipartisan Policy Center, in 2009, Mr. Allen taught National Security Policymaking at the George Washington University Elliott School of International Affairs and served as an advisor for the congressionally-created Commission on WMD and Terrorism.
Mr. Allen was the Intelligence Team Lead for the Romney for President Transition Team and is currently the Intelligence Chairman for the John Hay Initiative. Allen is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, The Atlantic Council, the Institute for Strategic and International Studies, and is a Senior Fellow for Cyber Security for the National Defense Industry Association (NDIA).
Mr. Allen is the author of Blinking Red: Crisis and Compromise in American Intelligence After 9/11. (Potomac Books, September 2013). Allen has also authored “Reforming National Intelligence: The 9/11 Commission,” in Triumphs and Tragedies of the Modern Congress (Center for the Study of the Presidency & Congress, 2014) and has published several op-eds including in the Wall Street Journal and Foreign Policy.
Mr. Allen received his L.L.M. with distinction in International Law from the Georgetown University Law Center, his J.D. from the University of Alabama (cum laude), and his B.A. from Vanderbilt University.
