September 4, 2014

FBI Announces Executive Appointments

FBI Director James B. Comey announced several executive appointments of personnel at Washington Field Office (WFO) and FBI Headquarters.

Andrew G. McCabe will become the assistant director in charge at WFO. He has been the executive assistant director of the National Security Branch at FBI Headquarters since October 2013; before that, he was the assistant director of the Counterterrorism Division. In September 2009, Mr. McCabe began serving as the first director of the High-Value Detainee Interrogation Group. Mr. McCabe joined the FBI in 1996 and has worked in the New York Field Office and WFO as an assistant special agent in charge of its Counterterrorism Division. At FBI Headquarters, he has held numerous positions in the Counterterrorism Division, in which he was responsible both domestic and extraterritorial investigations of counterterrorism subjects.

John Giacalone will succeed Mr. McCabe as the executive assistant director of the National Security Branch at FBI Headquarters. He most recently served as the assistant director of the Counterterrorism Division at FBI Headquarters. He started his FBI career in 1991 in the New York Field Office and, 20 years later, returned to be its special agent in charge for the Counterterrorism Division. Mr. Giacalone also worked in the Philadelphia Field Office and directed that division’s first field intelligence group. He has represented the Bureau as the deputy on-scene commander in the Iraqi theater of operations and coordinated the efforts of the FBI with the intelligence community and the U.S. military.

Michael Steinbach will replace Mr. Giacalone as assistant director of the Counterterrorism Division. He most recently served as the division’s deputy assistant director. Before that, he was the special agent in charge of the Miami and Jacksonville Field Offices. Mr. Steinbach began his career as a special agent with the FBI in April 1995 in the Chicago Field Office. In 2004, he served as the deputy on-scene commander for FBI operations in Afghanistan. Mr. Steinbach has also represented the FBI as a legal attaché in Tel Aviv, Israel. While there, he worked with the government of Israel and the Palestinian Authority on all FBI investigative matters, with an emphasis on national security issues. In 2010, Mr. Steinbach became the deputy director for Law Enforcement Services at the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center and later served as a special assistant to the FBI’s associate deputy director.