Michael Cannon

Michael A. Cannon currently serves as Chief Counsel for the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet Authority).  

The FirstNet Authority OCC is responsible for ensuring the legally sound interpretation and administration of FirstNet Authority’s enabling legislation and other applicable authorities that impact its operations; delivering legal counsel concerning FirstNet Authority’s technical responsibilities with respect to the NPSBN, including advocacy before the FCC; managing FirstNet Authority’s compliance program; assisting in litigation defense; overseeing the prompt and proper response to OIG and GAO audits and investigations; reviewing agreements, legislation, and correspondence for legal sufficiency; enforcing FirstNet Authority’s intellectual property rights; and ensuring prompt and accurate legal support is provided to the Board and all employees with respect to administrative law, ethics, environmental and historic preservation, employment law, and fiscal law.

Prior to serving in this position, he served as Chief Counsel for Economic affairs overseeing a staff providing legal advice and services to Office of the Under Secretary for Economic Affairs, the Bureau of Economic Analysis, and the U.S. Census Bureau, in addition to formerly serving as the Chief of the General Litigation Division for the U.S. Department of Commerce overseeing a staff that handled a wide variety of federal litigation matters such as tort litigation, constitutional claims, personal injury and property claims, representation of individual agency employees, administrative law, commercial law and bankruptcies, and evidentiary and testimonial procedures. He has over 40 years of government service which includes active-duty military service, employment with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and his career at the U.S. Department of Commerce which he began in 1992. He is a retired Navy Captain where he served as a Radar Intercept Officer in the F-14 Tomcat. He is married to the former Mary Ann Schult, and has three children, Joseph, Beth, and Anna, and resides in Ashburn, Virginia.