Software Engineer - Forward Deployed - National Security

Forward-Deployed AI Engineer — National SecurityWashington, DC $180K–$220K + Equity About the RoleOur client builds AI for the people who protect this country. The work matters. The stakes are not abstract.You'll deploy their platform into high-consequence environments across the U.S. national security community — intelligence, defense, and law enforcement. You own the full arc: scoping, integration, live operation, and customer trust, in settings where ambiguity is the default and the margin for error is thin.This is not a field support role. You're a core engineer who thrives at the point of contact — someone who ships production code during the week and deploys it into a SCIF on Friday. You contribute meaningfully to the codebase, not just operate on top of it.What You'll DoContribute directly to the core platform — writing production code, building features, and extending agent capabilities alongside the engineering teamDeploy and operate agentic AI systems in sensitive government and defense environments with full technical ownership from integration through live operationServe as the primary technical interface to mission owners and operators, learning their workflows before they have to explain them twiceBuild rapid prototypes and custom integrations in hours, not sprints — then bring the best of those back into the core productTranslate field requirements and edge cases back to the engineering team with precision, urgency, and working codeStand up and maintain field infrastructure across heterogeneous hardware and networking environmentsConduct live demonstrations to senior government and military stakeholders where failure is not an optionWhat You'll Bring0–4 years of software engineering experience, ideally in a customer-facing or field capacityExperience with Python or TypeScriptAbility to operate independently at customer sites with minimal oversightEligibility for a U.S. security clearance (active clearance a plus)Please note the client is also interested in fresh grads as long as you have had internships and gone to a top 20 CS college