Cabinet officer kept from State of the Union as designated survivor fail-safe

Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins appeared to be President Donald Trump’s pick as designated survivor for the State of the Union address Tuesday night, kept away from the Capitol to ensure government continuity if a catastrophic event killed federal leadership gathered for the event. The White House did not immediately confirm Collins’s selection.

The practice of designating a Cabinet member to stay away from major government gatherings began during the Cold War, formalized in the 1980s as a safeguard against nuclear attack. The role carries extraordinary psychological weight, with those selected describing it as sobering and humbling — a reminder they could suddenly be thrust into the presidency of a wounded nation.

Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins performed a distinctly modern duty Tuesday night: the job of not being present. While President Donald Trump delivered the State of the Union address before a packed House chamber, Collins remained in a secure, undisclosed location — designated by the White House as the fail-safe in case of catastrophe.

His role places him in a tradition dating to the nuclear tensions of the Cold War: the designated survivor, a Cabinet member sequestered away while virtually all other federal leadership gathers in one room.

“It focuses your mind,” said James Nicholson, who held the role during President George W. Bush’s 2006 State of the Union. “It also enhances your prayer that it doesn’t happen to you.”

The practice reflects a grim calculation buried in U.S. government protocol: that at any moment, a single catastrophic event — a terrorist attack, a natural disaster, a military strike — could wipe out the entire chain of presidential succession. The designated survivor stands as an insurance policy against governmental paralysis.

Collins was not seen in the House chamber during Tuesday’s address. The White House did not immediately confirm he was the chosen survivor, but his absence was notable. This was his second designation in as many years; he also sat out for the president’s address to a joint session of Congress in 2025.

From Cold War Fear to Modern Continuity

The formal structure emerged from Cold War dread. The Carter and Reagan administrations, facing Soviet submarines just off the Atlantic coast, formalized the practice in April 1980. The White House Military Office tasked the Federal Emergency Management Agency with ensuring succession — an aide would be directed to recommend to the president which officials should skip events when all possible successors were together outside the White House.

Ronald Reagan’s Education Secretary Terrel Bell holds the distinction of being the first publicly identified designated survivor, in 1981 — though he wasn’t named until after the speech.

A more recent example underscores the ongoing concern. A military helicopter that collided with a regional jet outside Reagan National Airport in January 2025 was on a continuity of government training mission, preparing the federal apparatus to function in case of catastrophe.

When the Role Meant Freedom

Before September 11, 2001, designated survivors had considerably more latitude. Bill Richardson, President Bill Clinton’s energy secretary, was chosen in 2000 and simply moved up a planned weekend trip to Oxford, Maryland — about 80 miles away — to be there during the State of the Union.

Dan Glickman, Clinton’s agriculture secretary, faced a different constraint when selected for the 1997 State of the Union. His hometown of Wichita, Kansas, was too far away, so he chose New York to stay with his daughter.

“I thought it was kind of exciting,” Glickman recalled. “But I wasn’t hyped up from a dangerous perspective. I don’t even think anybody told me to be careful.”

The Weight of Sudden Power

The post-9/11 security posture shifted dramatically. When Alberto Gonzales, Bush’s attorney general, was designated for the 2007 State of the Union, White House chief of staff Josh Bolten called to offer location options — Gonzales would not choose for himself.

Gonzales opted to be in flight. He arrived at Andrews Air Force Base to find members of major federal departments waiting to accompany him, carrying thick briefing binders stuffed with protocols, just in case.

“It was during that time that it sort of suddenly hit me, if something happened in the Capitol and everyone’s killed, that I’d be president,” Gonzales said. “It’s sort of sobering. And you wonder, ‘Would I be up to governing a wounded nation?’”

Nicholson described a similar psychological moment. He underwent briefings in a command center while watching the speech from the air, and was served dinner prepared by the White House mess. “It made you think that, at least if this awful thing happened, you’d be well fed,” he said.

The enormity of the role weighed on him. “You think about, remote as it is, this is something you might have to do,” Nicholson said. And the weight was personal: his wife was in the chamber, meaning if catastrophe struck, she could have been among the victims.

The “Worst Club Ever”

Glickman’s experience captured the strange mixture of privilege and constraint. He boarded an Air Force G-3 with Secret Service agents, a military official, and advisers not on his usual staff. A three-car motorcade carried him from LaGuardia Airport to his daughter’s apartment near Union Square.

When his daughter wanted to invite others to watch the speech, Glickman declined. “This was not a party,” he said. He was told not to dress up — he skipped the suit — and spared from studying briefing books or memorizing security protocols.

After the speech, he declined the Secret Service’s offer of a ride to the airport, planning instead to have dinner with his daughter. It was sleeting, making taxis scarce, and the motorcade left without him.

“I was the most powerful man on the face of the earth, theoretically,” Glickman joked later about that moment. “And then I can’t even get a cab.”

Nicholson, reflecting on his experience, observed that the designated survivors might form a community of shared understanding. “We don’t have a club,” he laughed. “We should.”

Historian and journalist Garrett M. Graff, author of “Raven Rock: The Story of the U.S. Government’s Secret Plan to Save Itself — While the Rest of Us Die,” said the role captivates the public because it combines the fascination with danger and the romance of an everyday official suddenly becoming president.

“The idea of, you’re just a random Cabinet official, and then something terrible happens and, all of a sudden, you’re president of the United States,” Graff said.