Prior to his nomination as undersecretary, the White House appointed Brown to head a transition team creating the Emergency Preparedness & Response Directorate within Department of Homeland Security. Before that, shortly after the September 11 attacks, Brown served on the Consequence Management Principals' Committee, which acted as the White House's policy coordination group for the federal domestic response to the attacks. Later, Bush asked him to head the Consequence Management Working Group to identify and resolve key issues regarding the federal response plan.