Joe Biden’s advisers accelerated his transition planning on Friday, as election results showed him with an advantage in the battlefield states that could grant him the presidency, with the first top officials in a potential Biden White House. possibly named next week.
In Wilmington, Delaware, and Washington, Biden’s advisers and allies are intensifying their conversations about who might fill critical positions, both in the West Wing and across agencies, guided largely by Biden’s plan to bring together what would be the most diverse cabinet in history. .
Behind-the-scenes activity underscored that even as Biden publicly delivered a disciplined message about the counting of every vote and refrained from claiming victory, he was already planning a quick start in office as the nation faces a worsening pandemic and a damaged economy. .
Biden, who ran from day one with a message to unite the country, is said to be interested in making a bipartisan gesture as he plans a possible government after a divisive election whose results President Donald Trump has tried to undermine. Biden is looking to fill out his potential White House staff first, and cabinet positions aren’t expected to be announced until Thanksgiving, according to more than half a dozen people familiar with the planning process who spoke on condition. anonymity to discuss the transition. .
Biden’s team quietly began raising money for its transition operation in May and has raised at least $ 7 million to pay for its efforts. The Biden camp has prepared for multiple scenarios in the event that Trump refuses to budge and his administration does not engage in a transition.
So far, Trump administration officials have worked in good faith, according to Biden officials, who said they hoped and expected that cooperation to continue.
How coronavirus
With infections reaching new highs, Biden’s aides are planning the first critical transition decisions to focus on healthcare and address the pandemic, the central theme of his campaign in recent months. They have assembled an internal group of roughly two dozen health policy and technology experts to discuss vaccine development and delivery, improve health data, and secure supply chains, among other topics.
“We are not waiting to get the job done,” Biden said in a speech Friday night.
Among those expected to play a key role in health care in the Biden administration is Vivek Murthy, a former surgeon general to President Barack Obama, who has privately advised Biden for months on the pandemic and is expected to play a huge public role as the face of the Democratic administration’s potential response to the virus, giving advice on wearing masks and social distancing.
Transitional officials are also looking at what kinds of economic action could be taken almost immediately, including repealing some of Trump’s executive orders, part of a tradition in which new presidents move quickly to change or reverse regulations in federal agencies.
The 77-year-old Biden has told his associates that he regards his two terms as vice president and his knowledge of how a White House operates from within as crucial advantages to building a government. And he has made it clear in public and in private that a diverse team is central to his mission.
“Men, women, gay, straight, middle, across the board, black, white, Asian,” Biden said this spring when discussing his future cabinet. “It really matters that you look like the country, because everyone brings a slightly different perspective.”
Although Biden and the Democrats had aggressively lobbied for control of the Senate, the party fell short in the contests contested this week. Now, Senate Republicans are likely to have veto power over their most important appointments, a reality looming over the talks, even if Democrats could still control the Senate if they win two runoff elections in Georgia in January.
Even before it was clear that Democrats would not get a clear majority in the Senate, Biden’s advisers began preparing for hard-hitting cabinet confirmation battles, bringing in top Obama veterans to lead what is informally called a transitional war room.
If Biden wins, he is expected to initially focus on filling the highest positions in the White House, including chief of staff, the most powerful staff position. Ron Klain, his former chief of staff as vice president, who served as the Ebola response coordinator in the White House under Obama, appears to have the inside track for that job, though others are reportedly still under serious consideration.
At the center of Biden’s transition planning is Ted Kaufman, his former Senate chief of staff, who was appointed to replace Biden as senator after he became vice president, as well as Jeff Zients, a former administration official. Obama
Like Biden, Kaufman is viewed as an institutionalist and wrote the law dedicating additional government resources to transition teams. Yohannes Abraham, who served in the Obama White House as a senior assistant to Valerie Jarrett and the National Economic Council, is overseeing the day-to-day operation.
Given his decades-long career in Washington, Biden has numerous relationships from his time in the Senate and the White House with people from various political areas. That story also means that his transition team has faced an avalanche of outside boards and former Biden associates vying for jobs and influence.
Parts of the cast who listened to Biden during the presidential campaign: Anita Dunn, Senior Advisor; Steve Ricchetti, another former vice president’s chief of staff; and Klain, are among those guiding the formation of a possible government. Sen. Kamala Harris of California, her running mate, is generating names and speaking regularly with Biden. In the orbit of Biden’s policies on the campaign, Jake Sullivan and Antony J. Blinken are widely viewed as the most influential figures, with both expected to hold high-level positions in a potential administration.
Where they land is considered one of the first decisions that would help determine other appointments. Sullivan, a former adviser to Hillary Clinton, is lined up for one of several positions, while Blinken, who served as the vice president’s national security adviser, is considered the top candidate for national security adviser.
Some of the most powerful cabinet positions in a possible Biden administration have already been perceived as leaders.
The top candidate to head the Department of Defense is Michèle Flournoy, a former Under Secretary of Defense for Policy who worked with Biden officials during the campaign. She would be the first woman to be appointed to the position.
Lael Brainard, who sits on the Federal Reserve board of governors and served in the Treasury Department under Obama, is the most talked about candidate to head the department, especially if the Senate is controlled by Republicans, which would make it more difficult to confirm. a more progressive election like Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
Susan Rice, a former national security adviser during the Obama administration who Biden examined for vice president, has been considered one of the main options for secretary of state, but the threat of Senate Republicans that prevent her from becoming the top diplomat of the nation in 2012 brought her into retirement. , and his nomination now would surely provoke a fight.
Blinken, a former undersecretary of state, has been discussed among Biden’s allies as a possible option, along with Senator Chris Coons of Delaware, a leading Biden supporter who in October wrote an article in Foreign Affairs magazine about his vision of the world.
Louisiana Representative Cedric Richmond, one of Biden’s campaign co-chairs and adviser, is expected to take on some role in the White House if the Democratic nominee wins. Another campaign co-chair, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, who was also on Biden’s vice-president search committee, could join a potential administration, although it was unclear what position might attract him to Washington.
Leaders of the Biden transition are aware that many officials in the federal bureaucracy have become demoralized and have felt marginalized during the Trump administration. In a small gesture, they are calling their potential first arrivals to agencies “agency review teams,” as opposed to what Operation Trump called “landing teams” in 2016.
Discussions are already hanging over the 2022 midterm elections, which have traditionally been a struggle for any party occupying the White House and which could be especially difficult for Democrats during an era of increasingly common progressive primary challenges.
Some Democratic House members who backed Biden from the beginning, like Representative Filemon B. Vela Jr. of Texas and Representative Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania, could be in line for administrative positions if they wanted to.
“We have an expression where I come from: you never forget the ones who took you to the dance,” Biden said at a stop with Boyle in Philadelphia this week.
Operation Biden is preparing for Trump to potentially hinder the transition. The transition team has already assembled a staff of more than 75 officers, with plans to increase that number to approximately 300 transition staff members by Opening Day in January. The administrator of the General Services Administration has the legal authority to release about $ 6.6 million in federal funding for Biden’s transition, and in recent years he has done so shortly after the race is called.
Pamela Pennington, a spokeswoman for the GSA, said in a statement that Emily W. Murphy, appointed by Trump as the agency’s administrator, would begin the official transition when it was clear that the race was over.
“The GSA administrator does not pick the winner in the presidential election,” Pennington said. “The GSA administrator determines the apparently successful candidate once the winner is clear based on the process established in the Constitution.”
Shane Goldmacher, Glenn Thrush, and Michael D. Shear c. 2020 The New York Times Company
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