Mr. Arnold joined the Department in February 2019 and currently serves as the Chief Operating Officer responsible for executive oversight of more than 110 Veterans Law Judges, 900 staff attorneys and 200 professional support staff dedicated to resolving veteran appeals regarding claims and eligibility for service-connected disability ratings and benefits, VA healthcare access or services, and VA cemetery or burial benefits. Immediately prior to his current role, Mr. Arnold served for three years at the Department of Justice, where he was responsible for the administrative management and operational functions of the DOJ Asset Forfeiture Program, including review and evaluation of all Asset Forfeiture Program activities and oversight of nearly $9 billion in asset forfeiture funds. His staff also provided centralized operations of forfeiture-related systems and applications used by roughly 9,000 Federal, State, and local law enforcement officers and prosecutors to account for nearly 1.5 million assets seized from criminal enterprises. Mr. Arnold previously served for four years as the Deputy Under Secretary for Economic Affairs at the Department of Commerce, overseeing three operating units comprising approximately 25% of the Department’s personnel.
Mr. Arnold is a retired U.S. Air Force judge advocate, starting his career when he enlisted at the age of 17. His active duty career spanned over 30 years in a wide range of assignments throughout the United States and overseas, to include service in Turkey, Kuwait, and Iraq. After spending a year on Capitol Hill as a National Defense Fellow, Mr. Arnold served four years as an Associate Deputy General Counsel for the Department of Defense before embarking on a variety of senior level positions which allowed him to lead several of the Air Force’s largest legal offices during the last 7 years of his military career. His last military assignment was as Chief of the Air Force’s General Litigation Division, where he led a team of nearly 90 attorneys and paralegals engaged in federal court litigation and administrative proceedings throughout the United States. He began his SES career in 2011.
Humbled and honored to serve our veterans in his current role, Mr. Arnold views his service at VA like returning home. When he was a toddler, his father became a 100% disabled veteran and their family was completely reliant on VA medical care and associated benefits. Mr. Arnold’s wife is also a former VA nurse.
