White House Lawyer Named New Head of DEA

White House lawyer Uttam Dhillon has been named the new head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Reuters reports.

Dhillon most recently served as deputy White House counsel. He is replacing Robert Patterson, who became the DEA’s acting head in October after Chuck Rosenberg left. Rosenberg had been acting head of the agency since 2015.

According to a DEA news release, Dhillon was confirmed by the Senate in 2006 as the first Director of the Office of Counternarcotics Enforcement at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). In that role, Dhillon served as the primary policy advisor on counternarcotics issues, focused on combating the connections between illegal drug trafficking and terrorism and developed regional counternarcotics strategies for DHS.