Change coming to Obama’s team, just not right away

Pres­i­dent Barack Obama speaks at his elec­tion night party, in Chicago. Fresh from his re-election, Obama will embark on a trip to South­east Asia and become the first U.S. pres­i­dent to visit Cam­bo­dia as well as the once pariah nation of Myan­mar where he will hail the country’s shift to democ­racy after five decades of ruinous mil­i­tary rule. (AP Photo/Chris Carl­son, File)

JULIE PACE

Asso­ci­ated Press

WASHINGTON — Big changes are com­ing to Pres­i­dent Barack Obama’s admin­is­tra­tion — just not right away.

The White House is mak­ing the nation’s high-stakes fis­cal cri­sis its top pri­or­ity com­ing out of the elec­tion, under­scor­ing the vital impor­tance of avert­ing severe year-end tax increases and spend­ing cuts, not just for the econ­omy but in set­ting the tone for Obama’s sec­ond term.

Still, Obama is weigh­ing replace­ments for high-profile offi­cials expected to leave his Cab­i­net and the White House soon. Trea­sury Sec­re­tary Tim­o­thy Gei­th­ner and Sec­re­tary of State Hillary Rod­ham Clin­ton both want to step down but have indi­cated a will­ing­ness to push their depar­tures into next year, or at least until suc­ces­sors are con­firmed. Defense Sec­re­tary Leon Panetta also wants to retire next year.

“The first thing is to try to find a way out of the box we’re in with regards to the fis­cal cliff,” said Tom Daschle, the for­mer Sen­ate major­ity leader who is close to Obama. “When the new Con­gress con­venes they’ll begin the nom­i­nat­ing process for what I expect will be a good num­ber of vacancies.”

Obama pri­vately delved into both issues Thurs­day, his first full day back in Wash­ing­ton fol­low­ing his re-election on Tues­day. The pres­i­dent and his team were also assess­ing how con­gres­sional Repub­li­cans were posi­tion­ing them­selves fol­low­ing the elec­tion before say­ing much pub­licly about his sec­ond term.

The pres­i­dent will make his first post­elec­tion com­ments on the econ­omy and the fis­cal cliff Fri­day at the White House.

In his vic­tory speech Tues­day night, Obama offered a call for rec­on­cil­i­a­tion after a divi­sive cam­paign. But he made clear he had an agenda in mind, cit­ing a need for changes in the tax code, as well as immi­gra­tion reform and cli­mate change.

Obama aides want to avoid what they believe was an over­reach by Pres­i­dent George W. Bush, who declared after nar­rowly win­ning re-election that he had “polit­i­cal cap­i­tal” and intended to spend it. One of Bush’s first moves was to push to pri­va­tize Social Secu­rity, a plan that was roundly rejected by Con­gress and the public.

The White House believes Obama has a clear man­date on one key issue: rais­ing taxes on fam­i­lies mak­ing more than $250,000 a year. Obama senior adviser David Plouffe said vot­ers “clearly chose the president’s view of mak­ing sure the wealth­i­est Amer­i­cans are asked to do a lit­tle bit more” to help shrink the fed­eral deficit.

The pres­i­dent has long advo­cated allow­ing tax cuts first passed by Bush to expire for upper income earn­ers. But he gave in to Repub­li­can demands in 2010 and allowed the cuts to con­tinue, anger­ing many Democrats.

Both par­ties agree that the com­bi­na­tion of tax increases and spend­ing cuts set to hit on Jan. 1 could plunge the econ­omy back into recession.

Repub­li­can House Speaker John Boehner said Wednes­day that he wanted to com­pro­mise with the re-elected pres­i­dent. And he said the House would be will­ing to accept higher tax rev­enue under the right con­di­tions as part of a more sweep­ing attempt to reduce deficits.

The White House wants con­sis­tency in its “fis­cal cliff” nego­ti­at­ing team, mean­ing Gei­th­ner is likely to put off his depar­ture from Trea­sury until Obama and law­mak­ers can reach some agreement.

White House chief of staff Jack Lew is seen as a lead­ing can­di­date to replace Gei­th­ner. Lew is well-respected in Wash­ing­ton by both par­ties and served as bud­get direc­tor under both Obama and for­mer Pres­i­dent Bill Clinton.

Another per­son often men­tioned as a pos­si­ble suc­ces­sor to Gei­th­ner is Ersk­ine Bowles, a White House chief of staff under Clin­ton and the co-chief of the White House’s 2010 deficit reduc­tion commission.

Both Lew and Bowles would bring an inti­mate knowl­edge of the intri­ca­cies of the fed­eral bud­get and could be expected to take a lead­ing role in try­ing to nego­ti­ate a broad bud­get agree­ment with Con­gress. The selec­tion of either would sig­nal that the admin­is­tra­tion intends to make res­o­lu­tion of the government’s deficit prob­lems a priority.

At State, the lead­ing can­di­dates to take over as the nation’s top diplo­mat are Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Susan Rice, the U.S. ambas­sador to the United Nations.

But Rice has faced crit­i­cism this fall from Repub­li­cans for pro­vid­ing ini­tial accounts about the deaths of Amer­i­cans in Beng­hazi, Libya, that later proved false. The White House has vig­or­ously defended Rice, but the prospect of start­ing a sec­ond term with a con­tentious con­fir­ma­tion hear­ing may be unappealing.

Kerry, an early Obama backer, has long cov­eted the State Depart­ment job. He made a well-regarded for­eign pol­icy speech at the Demo­c­ra­tic con­ven­tion and even played the role of Rom­ney dur­ing cam­paign debate prepa­ra­tions this year.

Other Cab­i­net sec­re­taries who have talked about leav­ing are Attor­ney Gen­eral Eric Holder and Trans­porta­tion Sec­re­tary Ray LaHood, the only Repub­li­can in the Cab­i­net. Both have said they would speak with the pres­i­dent before mak­ing a final decision.

Sec­ond term shake-ups are also sure to hit Obama’s West Wing inner cir­cle. Plouffe is expected to be among those depart­ing, while Obama’s senior adviser and close friend Valerie Jar­rett is stay­ing on.

And if Obama taps Lew for the Trea­sury Depart­ment, he’ll have to add chief of staff to the list of vacancies

Posted by AP News on Nov 8 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.