Kupfer focuses on diplomat Mike Pompeo. Pompeo always knows his audience, which is perhaps the best answer to why he's been able to keep a senior position since the beginning of the Trump ...administration. April marks one year since Pompeo became secretary of state: an eternity in this cabinet, where top officials come and go as they gain and lose the presidential seal of approval. Pompeo, a California native and former Kansas congressman, has been in Donald Trump's cabinet since Trump tapped him as CIA director in January 2017. That practically makes him, as South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham recently quipped at a committee hearing, the longest-serving member of government.