Politico | Joe Biden unveils diverse economic team as challenges grow

The president-elect intends to name Cecilia Rouse, Neera Tanden and Wally Adeyemo to senior roles in administration
Team will inherit a struggling US economy and one of the weakest labour markets in the country’s history

Joe Biden

POLITICO

Published: 12:41pm, 30 Nov 2020

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This story is published in a content partnership with POLITICO. It was originally reported by Megan Cassella, Ben White and Tyler Pager on politico.com on November 29, 2020.

After facing criticism for the lack of diversity in his first round of hires, President-elect Joe Biden plans to announce three people of colour for leading positions on his economic team.

According to two people close to Biden’s presidential transition, he is expected to name Cecilia Rouse, an African American economist at Princeton University, to lead the Council of Economic Advisers.

Adewale “Wally” Adeyemo, a Nigerian-born lawyer and former senior international economic adviser during the Obama administration, will serve as deputy Treasury secretary under former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen, who Biden plans to appoint to lead the Treasury Department.

And as director of the Office of Management and Budget, Biden plans to nominate Neera Tanden, president of the liberal think tank Centre for American Progress, and a former senior policy adviser to both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaigns. Tanden is Indian American.

Biden also plans to name long-time economic aides Heather Boushey and Jared Bernstein to serve on the CEA, according to people familiar with the plans. Both Boushey and Bernstein are white.

As director of the Office of Management and Budget, Joe Biden plans to nominate Neera Tanden. Photo: Reuters

Biden has been under rising pressure to select more people of colour for senior jobs in his administration. One of his most prominent allies, Jim Clyburn, told reporters last week he was unhappy with the number of black people in Biden’s administration. Clyburn, the highest ranking black lawmaker in Congress, was widely credited with helping Biden win the South Carolina presidential primary, which revived his struggling campaign.

“From all I hear, black people have been given fair consideration,” Clyburn told The Hill newspaper. “But there is only one black woman so far.”

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“I want to see where the process leads to, what it produces,” he added. “But so far it’s not good.”

The newly announced team will inherit a struggling US economy and one of the weakest labour markets in the country’s history, with more than 20 million Americans receiving jobless benefits and an unemployment rate near 7 per cent. Biden has vowed to pass major economic stimulus and relief programmes and provide aid to jobless workers as well as state and local governments, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and the Republican-led Senate have been loath to move on major spending packages – leaving Biden with limited tools to address the spiralling crisis.

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As the coronavirus surges, the economy is widely expected to hit another downturn as more states and localities issue new shutdown restrictions, throwing more employees out of work. At the same time, a handful of the aid programmes Congress passed in the spring are set to expire at the end of the year, including expanded unemployment insurance, a national eviction moratorium and delays for student loan payments.

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Without action by Congress in the next month to extend further relief, an estimated 12 million people will lose their jobless benefits at the end of the year. As many as 87 million public and private sector workers could lose access to paid sick and medical leave. The combination of less federal aid, more shutdown restrictions and spiking coronavirus cases and deaths will have a resounding effect on the entire US economy, potentially reversing the slow economic recovery that had begun.

Read Politico’s story.

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