Command Sgt. Maj. John Sampa will be the next senior enlisted soldier of the Army National Guard, the component’s three-star boss announced Monday.
“I look forward to his advice on Army Guard policies and actions affecting enlisted soldiers,” Lt. Gen. Timothy Kadavy, director of the Army National Guard, said in a Facebook post Monday. “Please help me welcome CSM Sampa to the team.”
Sampa will be the 12th command sergeant major of the Army National Guard. He currently serves as the Texas Military Department Command senior enlisted adviser.
Before that assignment, Sampa served as the command sergeant major of the Texas Guard’s 36th Infantry Division and its more than 14,000 soldiers, according to a 2013 press release.
Sampa previously deployed with the 36th Infantry Division to Iraq in 2005. There, he served as a company first sergeant for the 56th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, the first Texas National Guard combat brigade to deploy to a theater of war since World War II, according to the release.
Sampa will be replacing Command Sgt. Maj. Christopher S. Kepner, who has held the position since May 2016. Kepner enlisted in the Army in 1980 to serve with the 82nd Airborne Division and 10th Mountain Division before joining the Pennsylvania National Guard in 1987. The last position he held was as the command sergeant major of the Pennsylvania Army Guard’s 28th Infantry Division.