Timeline mid-term vacancy Internet Area Director position
Dear all,
On 2 October the IETF Chair announced that Tommy Jensen, Internet (INT) Area Director, has resigned from the IESG [1].
According to Section 3.5 of RFC 8713, the mid-term vacancy of the Internet Area Director position will start a selection process for a new candidate by the 2025-2026 NomCom, followed by confirmation of the selected candidate by the IAB. The term of appointment for this mid-term vacant position runs until March 2028 (see appointment announcement [2]).
The mid-term selection is still with the 2025-2026 NomCom, as detailed in Section 3.5 of RFC 8713. The call for nominations will start on Wednesday 10 October and will run in parallel with the current 2026-2027 NomCom cycle, which also includes an open Internet Area Director position.
The 2025–2026 NomCom Chair and the 2026–2027 NomCom Chair will coordinate nominations for the Internet Area Director positions as needed.
The timelines for the selection and appointment procedure are as follows:
2026-10-07 - Call for nominations
2026-10-21 - Deadline for accepting nominations
2026-10-22 - Nominees slates finalized, call for community feedback
2026-10-23 - (Virtual) interviews commence, deliberations start
2026-10-30 - End of community feedback period
2026-11-06 - Selection sent for confirmation
2026-11-06 to 2026-11-20 - Confirmation with selected candidate, notification of other nominees, announcement
2027-11-20 - Confirmed candidate seated
The timeline is rather tight, with only six weeks after the vacancy is announced. Also, the confirming body has two weeks to reject the candidate, otherwise the candidate is assumed to be confirmed.
Thanks,
Benno Overeinder
nomcom-chair-2025@ietf.org
[1] https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf-announce/qwarn2pmj9fdyTTd1gBv6QbTXfU/
[2] https://datatracker.ietf.org/nomcom/ann/2207563/