There you have it! Ten years ago today, I raised my right hand and became an American.
August 9, 2026 · 0 likes · 0 comments
Defense Cybersecurity Workforce
There you have it! Ten years ago today, I raised my right hand and became an American.
August 9, 2016. A kid from Marseille who started his first company at 15, who barely spoke the language when he first landed, stood in a room full of strangers from every corner of the earth and swore an oath to a country that had every reason to say no — and said yes instead.
America didn't owe me anything. It gave me everything.
So today isn't about looking back. It's about the debt.
When you're handed a country like this, you don't say thank you with words. You say it with tangible outcomes.
I tried to pay it back:
I served as the first Chief Software Officer of the U.S. Air Force and Space Force — handed the job of dragging how our military builds and secures software into the modern era, so the men and women who defend this country aren't sent into a fight with tools a decade out of date.
I advised the Department of Defense on cloud and DevSecOps, and served as Chief Architect for Cyber.gov at the Department of Homeland Security — because the networks that run this nation were wide open, and someone had to close the doors.
I built Ask Sage — the first generative-AI platform cleared to FedRAMP High — so government teams could use AI without handing the keys to an adversary. We created lots of American jobs and opportunities. Every line of it built here.
Ten companies. More than 187 products. Started with nothing but a laptop and a stubborn belief that this was the one country on earth where that was enough.
I know the version of America the headlines sell you. I've walked the halls where the real decisions get made, and I'll tell you what I actually found: a country that let an immigrant with an accent and no connections build, fail, build again, and eventually stand in the room where the nation's software gets decided. Try that anywhere else. I'll wait.
My kids are Americans now. They'll never know what it feels like to want this passport and not have it. That's the whole point. That's what you build for.
To the country that had me — thank you. I hope I've given back even a fraction of what you gave me. And I'm not done.
Ten years an American. Still the best decision I ever made.
🇺🇸
August 9, 2016. A kid from Marseille who started his first company at 15, who barely spoke the language when he first landed, stood in a room full of strangers from every corner of the earth and swore an oath to a country that had every reason to say no — and said yes instead.
America didn't owe me anything. It gave me everything.
So today isn't about looking back. It's about the debt.
When you're handed a country like this, you don't say thank you with words. You say it with tangible outcomes.
I tried to pay it back:
I served as the first Chief Software Officer of the U.S. Air Force and Space Force — handed the job of dragging how our military builds and secures software into the modern era, so the men and women who defend this country aren't sent into a fight with tools a decade out of date.
I advised the Department of Defense on cloud and DevSecOps, and served as Chief Architect for Cyber.gov at the Department of Homeland Security — because the networks that run this nation were wide open, and someone had to close the doors.
I built Ask Sage — the first generative-AI platform cleared to FedRAMP High — so government teams could use AI without handing the keys to an adversary. We created lots of American jobs and opportunities. Every line of it built here.
Ten companies. More than 187 products. Started with nothing but a laptop and a stubborn belief that this was the one country on earth where that was enough.
I know the version of America the headlines sell you. I've walked the halls where the real decisions get made, and I'll tell you what I actually found: a country that let an immigrant with an accent and no connections build, fail, build again, and eventually stand in the room where the nation's software gets decided. Try that anywhere else. I'll wait.
My kids are Americans now. They'll never know what it feels like to want this passport and not have it. That's the whole point. That's what you build for.
To the country that had me — thank you. I hope I've given back even a fraction of what you gave me. And I'm not done.
Ten years an American. Still the best decision I ever made.
🇺🇸