44’s Top 44

 Welcome to 44’s top 44.

This list is a rundown of the people President Obama relies on to make his administration operate.

The people described in the pages that follow are tirelessly attempting to achieve the president’s second term goals. Many of them are veterans of either the president’s first term or his 2012 reelection effort.

{mosads}Some of the 44th president’s confidantes are working inside the White House, including chief of staff Denis McDonough, senior adviser Valerie Jarrett and director of speechwriting Cody Keenan.

There are many others on The Hill’s list who don’t spend a lot of time at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. But they are running huge programs, such as Richard Cordray, who heads the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau director, and Robert Hale, the Pentagon comptroller and chief financial officer.

The list generally doesn’t include Cabinet members because those officials are obviously key members of Obama’s team. An exception to that rule is Michael Froman, the nation’s top trade official who is negotiating major deals with a variety of nations.

Several health experts working for Obama made the cut, including Chris Jennings. The veteran of the Clinton White House is playing a crucial role in trying to fix the implementation problems plaguing ObamaCare. Jeff Zients, who is tasked with fixing HealthCare.gov, also makes an appearance.

Other policy officials who are in this special section work on energy, telecommunications, intelligence, homeland security, food safety and the budget.

Communication and messaging officials are also recognized. Dan Pfeiffer, Jay Carney, Josh Earnest, Caitlin Hayden, Eric Schultz and Amy Brundage are among Obama’s 44 go-to players.  

Several White House officials on the list are especially busy this fall in the wake of the flawed ObamaCare rollout: deputy chief of staff for policy Rob Nabors; deputy senior communications adviser David Simas and director of legislative affairs Miguel Rodriguez. The trio has been attempting to soothe tensions between congressional Democrats and the White House.

We hope this list will be an excellent reference for members of Congress, Capitol Hill staffers, regulators, lobbyists and others.

 

Tony Blinken, deputy national security adviser

Tony Blinken’s emergence on the national stage came when he answered questions at the White House briefing room about the U.S. response to chemical weapons use in Syria.

For decades, the 51-year-old foreign policy veteran had worked behind the scenes, steering foreign policy in the Clinton administration.

During former President George W Bush’s administration, he worked as a staff director and trusted adviser to Vice President Biden, who was then the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Blinken was forced to walk back an interview with NPR in which he said that President Obama would not strike Syria without congressional approval, but the misstep hasn’t kept the White House from leaning heavily on the former New Republic journalist to talk foreign policy to the press.

— Justin Sink

Amy Brundage, deputy press secretary

Amy Brundage is responsible for framing economic fights with Congress to the public — an important role, given how President Obama’s agenda has been dominated by budget battles.

A holdover from Obama’s Senate staff, Brundage attended the College of the Holy Cross with Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau before taking an internship in John Kerry’s (D-Mass.) Senate office. She was hired as a scheduler to Kerry’s presidential campaign, joined his Senate staff in 2005 and eventually became his national press secretary.

She took the same position in Obama’s Senate shop in 2007 and has followed the president ever since, serving as the spokeswoman for his presidential transition team and then as regional communications director at the White House.

She became deputy press secretary in 2011.

— Justin Sink

Sylvia Burwell, White House budget director

President Obama dipped again into the Clinton-era Democratic talent pool this year when he tapped Sylvia Burwell to be his new director of the Office of Management and Budget.

The West Virginia native had served as former President Clinton’s deputy OMB director during an era of balanced budgets, before going on to lead the Wal-Mart Foundation. Burwell is well liked by Republicans and was confirmed by the Senate in a 96-0 vote in April. As Obama tried to woo centrist Senate Republicans for a budget deal, Burwell became a major player.

When that effort failed and the fiscal standoff with Congress deepened, she was tasked with preparing the government for its first shutdown since 1996.

— Erik Wasson

Jay Carney, White House press secretary

President Obama’s tough year has made his press secretary’s job even harder.

Jay Carney has served as the public face of the White House in a year dominated by pointed questions about ObamaCare, the IRS, National Security Agency surveillance programs and many other issues.

Carney used to ask the tough questions as a reporter for Time magazine, working as a White House correspondent and Moscow bureau chief.

He joined the Obama administration as press secretary to Vice President Biden, moving into the West Wing after the departure of longtime Obama confidante Robert Gibbs.

Asked earlier this year about his job, Carney said he relished the tough questions and sharp exchanges, saying it was a privilege to stand at the presidential podium.

— Justin Sink

James Clapper, director of national intelligence

James Clapper, the nation’s top intelligence official, is at the center of the controversy over the National Security Agency’s surveillance programs.

Congress created the role of Director of National Intelligence after Sept. 11, 2001, to coordinate and oversee the 17 intelligence agencies and to be the president’s top intelligence adviser. Clapper, a retired Air Force general, is the fourth official to hold the job.

Following the security leaks by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, Clapper has testified in front of Congress numerous times defending the intelligence community and the secrecy that shrouds it.

Some members of Congress have called for Clapper to resign due to a false answer he gave during a Senate hearing earlier in the year. Clapper had claimed that the government does “not wittingly” collect any information on millions of Americans. In fact, the Snowden leaks revealed that the NSA collects records on virtually all U.S. phone calls.

— Brendan Sasso

Gary Cohen, deputy administrator and director, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

Gary Cohen isn’t the public face of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, but as the White House point man at the agency tasked with implementing the Affordable Care Act, he’s having to negotiate through a thorny patch of political and logistical issues. 

Among the plates the CMS has spinning under Cohen’s leadership: the strategic decision to withhold ObamaCare enrollment data; tempering expectations to reflect slow initial interest; the high-wire act of fixing a broken website while it’s available to consumers; daily media availabilities with tech status updates; working with contractors that the CMS has publicly criticized; and responding to subpoenas and committee requests.

He holds a law degree from Stanford University School of Law and received a bachelor’s degree from Brown University.

— Jonathan Easley

Richard Cordray, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau director

Richard Cordray is charting the course for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, perhaps the most significant piece of President Obama’s landmark financial reform law.

The new bureau is intended to ensure consumers are treated fairly by mortgage providers, credit card companies and other financial players, and Cordray has the authority to crack down on bad actors.

Republicans and industry groups have grumbled that the bureau has too much power, and friction is likely during the director’s five-year term. Yet Cordray, a former state attorney general and treasurer from Ohio, has won positive reviews on the job so far after a rocky confirmation fight.

— Peter Schroeder

Michael Daniel, Special assistant to the president and cybersecurity coordinator

Michael Daniel is the president’s top adviser for cybersecurity issues. A martial arts enthusiast, he spent 17 years at the Office of Management and Budget, including time overseeing intelligence agencies.

Daniel’s job is to protect government computer systems from hackers and to work with the private sector to better protect their networks. The White House had urged Congress to pass legislation to require cybersecurity standards for critical infrastructure, such as banks, telecommunications companies and power grids. But Republicans blocked the bill, arguing it would impose burdensome new regulations.

Following the measure’s failure, Obama issued an executive order to set voluntary cybersecurity rules. Daniel will try to convince companies to follow those guidelines, which are being crafted by the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

— Brendan Sasso

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

Gen. Martin Dempsey has become the president’s key military adviser as the administration navigates through a host of foreign policy challenges in President Obama’s second term.

The four-star Army general, known for his ability to carry a tune, has been at the helm of the Joint Chiefs of Staff since 2011, and the president tapped him for a second two-year term earlier this year.

Dempsey gave the president cover this year from criticism in Congress over Syria, as the chairman repeatedly expressed skepticism toward military action when defense hawks were clamoring for airstrikes and a no-fly zone. Now he’s tasked with handling the difficult decisions that accompany ending the longest war in U.S. history, in Afghanistan, by the end of 2014.

— Jeremy Herb

Josh Earnest, White House principal deputy press secretary

In a sea of new faces in the West Wing, Josh Earnest is a constant. 

An “Obama Original,” Earnest, who has been with the president since he began his run for the White House in 2007, provides institutional knowledge on almost every aspect of the press shop and its dealings. 

He not only serves as a mouthpiece for Obama — even subbing for White House press secretary Jay Carney at the podium and on Air Force One from time to time — he makes decisions from logistics to larger administration rollouts, and manages personnel to boot. 

Some observers speculate that the even-keeled Missouri native is a front-runner to replace Carney at the podium when he chooses to step down.

Earnest says the give-and-take with the media is a good thing.

“If there isn’t some tension between the press office and the press corps, then at least one side is not doing their job,” Earnest said. “But, if you remember that a little conflict is built in to the system, then it’s a little easier to get past it and not let it interfere with doing your job. That mindset is evident in both the most effective journalists and the most effective spokespeople.”

— Amie Parnes 

Michael Froman, U.S. trade representative

Michael Froman’s relationship with President Obama dates back more than two decades, to their time together as editors working on the Harvard Law Review.

Now the nation’s top trade official, Froman serves as Obama’s principal adviser and negotiator on international trade issues.

The former Citigroup executive is now at the forefront of negotiations in support of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a major trade pact including Canada, Mexico, Japan and a host of other nations.

The 51-year old policymaker is also the president’s proxy in talks between the U.S. and the European Union, known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. He was confirmed by the Senate by a 93-4 vote in June. 

— Ben Goad

Jason Furman, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers

Jason Furman capped years of work as an economic adviser to President Obama with his appointment as chief of the president’s economic council.

Furman was a central player in the development and implementation of the Obama administration’s two tent-pole first-term accomplishments: the stimulus package and the Affordable Care Act. 

A White House official described him as “one of the key architects” of the 2010 payroll tax cut. He was also an advocate for the 2012 tax deal that increased the marginal tax rate on the wealthiest Americans.

The Harvard-trained Ph.D. also served as the face of the White House’s effort to repeal the sequester.

— Justin Sink

Joe Goffman, counsel, Environmental Protection Agency Office of Air and Radiation

A big chunk of President Obama’s climate agenda lies in the hands of Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy as the agency crafts carbon emissions rules for power plants.

That means, behind the scenes, Joe Goffman is a crucial player in the ambitious plan to craft emissions rules for the nation’s existing power plants, which the agency plans to finalize in 2015.

He’s already been through a tough challenge in crafting separate proposed rules for existing plants. White House climate adviser Heather Zichal quipped in September that Goffman is “the guy that looks like he just spent the summer reading 2.5 million comments.”

Goffman was previously a senior aide with the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. He holds undergraduate and law degrees from Yale University.

— Ben Geman

Avril Haines, deputy director of the CIA

Avril Haines is the president’s go-to lawyer at the Central Intelligence Agency as the agency revamps its controversial drone strike program. She had never worked for the CIA before President Obama tapped her for the role in June, a surprise move less than two months after he’d nominated her to be the top lawyer at the State Department.

Haines previously served as the legal counsel on the president’s National Security Council, where she helped develop the new legal standards underpinning the targeted killings of alleged terrorists that the president demanded following mounting reports of civilian casualties in airstrikes. 

Consistently described as a soft-spoken workaholic, Haines has a most unconventional background for a Washington power player, having been an amateur pilot and a bookstore owner before her career as a government lawyer.

— Julian Pecquet

Robert Hale, Pentagon comptroller and chief financial officer

Hale became the point person inside the Pentagon to usher in billions in budget cuts under the 2011 Budget Control Act. 

Instituted under then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates, the measure’s cuts faced severe criticism from defense hawks in Congress, who claimed they would reduce the Pentagon’s ability to fight future wars. 

Obama is now looking to Hale to shepherd an additional $500 billion in defense spending reductions under the administration’s sequestration plan. The cuts began in March and would reduce Pentagon spending by $52 billion next year.

Hale, a former Congressional Budget Office staffer, graduated from Stanford University with a degree in mathematics and statistics.

— Carlo Muñoz

Caitlin Hayden, National Security Council spokeswoman

A career civil servant in the State Department, Hayden had been doing national security work for the U.S. government since finishing graduate school at the University of Georgia. (Despite her stint in Athens, she still roots for her undergraduate alma mater, Alabama.) 

Her career in Foggy Bottom began the day before 9/11, and Hayden has since done stints in Kuwait, Iraq and the United Kingdom, as well as taken dozens of trips to hot spots like Afghanistan and Pakistan.

She’ll travel to Iceland next year to marry an Icelandic diplomat serving in Washington.

— Justin Sink

John Holdren, White House science adviser

A big part of President Obama’s push on climate change rests on a simple message: Follow the science.

The president relies on John Holdren, a bookish Harvard professor before joining the White House, as one of the people who can deliver that message.

This low-key post includes supplying Obama’s staff with scientific information that informs policy, not to mention serving as a bridge to academia and other stakeholders, and helping to craft the federal research budget.

Holdren was previously the Teresa and John Heinz professor of environmental policy and director of the program on science, technology and public policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, according to the White House.

He was also a professor in Harvard’s Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, and director of the independent, nonprofit Woods Hole Research Center.

— Ben Geman 

Valerie Jarrett, White House senior adviser

Vogue magazine dubbed her President Obama’s rock. 

And as far as the West Wing goes, that couldn’t be truer of senior adviser and longtime Obama friend Valerie Jarrett. 

Jarrett, 56, arrived in Washington with no national political experience. 

Still, the 57-year-old lawyer and former chairman of the Chicago Transit Board, has long been the president’s eyes and ears around the White House.

As one senior administration official put it, she is in charge of “getting the president’s message out and bringing the people’s message in.”

Moreover, she counsels the president on some of his biggest and most pressing decisions because no one on the staff is quite as familiar with what makes him tick.

As a longtime pal of the first couple who often spends time with the family in the residence, “she yields the most power in the White House,” said one former senior administration official. “And everyone knows that. I don’t think the president trusts anyone more.”

And while other aides around the president have left the White House orbit, Jarrett is a mainstay.

— Amie Parnes

Chris Jennings, deputy assistant to the president for health policy

Chris Jennings was a pre-ObamaCare-rollout addition to the president’s staff whose role became even more critical after the law’s catastrophic launch. 

He spent six years as a senior adviser to President Clinton, 10 years as a Senate aide, and more than a decade as a healthcare lobbyist and consultant. He helped negotiate major healthcare deals in the 1990s, most notably the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. 

His Capitol Hill connections and reputation as a communicator who can cross the partisan divide makes him a critical component of the White House team. Jennings is one of the few who can go deep into the healthcare policy weeds while also reading the political winds.

— Jonathan Easley

Cody Keenan, White House director of speechwriting

Cody Keenan never expected to be a speechwriter. Period. Never mind the chief speechwriter for a president known for, well, giving speeches. 

For a while at least, the 33-year-old Connecticut native had ambitions of being an orthopedic surgeon.

But here he is in the West Wing, more than six years after joining the Obama campaign as a speechwriting intern. He is responsible for helping to craft some of President Obama’s most memorable speeches, including the one almost a year ago in Newtown, Conn., in the days following the mass shooting at an elementary school. 

While Keenan notes that Obama is really the head speechwriter, he said he does feel a “crushing sense of responsibility” in the role and in knowing the president’s voice. 

He sits in on the 7:45 a.m. meeting each morning with top White House aides and meets with the president on an average of a few times a week to go over upcoming speeches. While his day in the West Wing typically ends around 7 p.m, the job follows him home, where he prefers to write at night. 

— Amie Parnes

Alyssa Mastromonaco, White House deputy chief of staff

If there’s any one who deserves much of the credit for keeping President Obama’s trains running on time, it’s Alyssa Mastromonaco, her colleagues say. 

Mastromonaco, 37, is responsible for overseeing scheduling, advance and presidential personnel. She spends a good chunk of her time making sure the first family, Secret Service and White House staff are all on the same page. 

But she can also be found at the heart of major issues facing the White House, including managing the response to Hurricane Sandy and other natural disasters.

A scheduler-at-heart who has worked in the Senate for John Kerry and later for his presidential bid, Mastromonaco is hyperorganized, as one would expect her to be, known to schedule reminders to catch her favorite TV show or take her vitamins, as she confessed to The Hill in an interview last year. 

“If this is the person you have to be, these are the things you have to do,” she said.

— Amie Parnes

Denis McDonough, White House chief of staff

Denis McDonough wears many hats as White House chief of staff. 

But his colleagues say his most important role in the job has been to play that of the “Congress whisperer.”

Since accepting the job earlier this year, McDonough, once an aide to former Sen. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.), has made it a priority to improve the dialogue with Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill. 

How has he done? “So far, so good,” said one top Democrat who was not keen on some of the chief of staff’s predecessors. 

One senior White House official said McDonough believes in engaging a wide swath of people to get input on agenda items and issues facing the White House. The official said McDonough has emphasized reaching out to journalists, strategists and other groups for their opinions on various issues. 

But more than anything, McDonough is what principal deputy press secretary Josh Earnest called “a staffer’s chief of staff.”

“Denis brings many strengths to the job,” Earnest said. “He has an incredible capacity to handle lots of different things.”

He’s been known to ride his bike to work. And earlier this year, after taking the job, he could be seen sporting a handwritten card attached to his workbag that read: “Denis McDonough, chief of staff.”

 — Amie Parnes

Tara McGuinness, senior communications adviser

Hiring Tara McGuinness this spring indicated the White House’s increasing focus on the ObamaCare rollout following the 2012 election. A strategic communications expert, she has helped shape the White House’s healthcare message at crucial times, including after the delay of the employer mandate in July and amid the ongoing problems with the enrollment website. While signaling early on that she would be helping to sell ObamaCare to the public, McGuinness’s work is now oriented toward assisting the White House as it navigates troubling news cycles focused on negative aspects of the healthcare rollout. 

McGuinness honed her skills as a press secretary on Secretary of State John Kerry’s 2004 presidential run and on a range of House, Senate and issue campaigns. She also helped lead Americans Against Escalation in Iraq before holding several senior positions at the Center for American Progress. 

— Elise Viebeck

Lisa Monaco, assistant to the president for homeland security & counterterrorism

President Obama’s chief counterterrorism adviser was in her first month on the job when homegrown terrorists planted bombs that killed three and injured dozens at the annual marathon in Boston, where Monaco was raised.

The University of Chicago Law School graduate was immediately thrust into the weeklong manhunt for the culprits, the latest chapter in a high-stakes, high-pressure career. 

Monaco is a veteran of former Attorney General Janet Reno’s Justice Department and worked to convict Enron executives as a prosecutor in the George W. Bush administration.

“Lisa has no rival when it comes to her dedication to this nation, her experience in national security issues and her excellent judgment,” Attorney General Eric Holder said after she was nominated.

— Justin Sink 

Cecilia Muñoz, director of the Domestic Policy Council

The veteran Latino civil rights advocate Muñoz is the White House’s foremost champion for immigration reform, one of Obama’s most important second-term goals.

The Detroit-born daughter of Bolivian immigrants, Muñoz was awarded a MacArthur Foundation fellowship in 2000 in recognition of her work on immigration policy.

She joined the administration after two decades at the National Council of La Raza, where she oversaw work on immigration policy, poverty, education, health and housing. 

The passage of immigration reform “will shape who we are just as much as failing to pass it will shape us,” Muñoz told an audience earlier this month at her alma mater, the University of Michigan.

— Justin Sink

Rob Nabors, White House deputy chief of staff for policy

Rob Nabors has repeatedly negotiated high-profile deals with Congress for the White House, making him one of the city’s most effective power brokers.

Most recently, the White House deputy chief of staff helped President Obama orchestrate October’s agreement to reopen the government. In 2011, as head of the White House Office of Legislative Affairs, the low-key Nabors catalyzed a similar budget deal that defined that summer.

The previous year, as senior adviser to then-White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, Nabors helped push through the healthcare reforms that remain the administration’s signature domestic achievement. And in 2009, as deputy to then-Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Peter Orszag, Nabors had a hand in the passage of Obama’s economic stimulus bill.

No stranger to the game, Nabors launched his Washington career with the OMB under the Clinton administration before moving to Capitol Hill, where he served as a top aide to  former Rep. Dave Obey (D-Wis.) on the Appropriations Committee.

— Mike Lillis 

Jennifer Palmieri, communications director

Jennifer Palmieri is a veteran of Washington’s political fights, and has the battle scars to prove it.

Palmieri, 46, served eight years in the Clinton White House, including three as deputy press secretary.

She later worked on both of John Edwards’s presidential campaigns, where she grew close to the candidate’s wife, Elizabeth. When Edwards’s infidelity and out-of-wedlock child were exposed, Palmieri became a top adviser to Elizabeth.

“Jen is one of the best communicators in either party, and we’re lucky she’s on our side of the ledger and agreed to come back in and do this,” Obama deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter told The Washington Post.

Before joining the Obama White House, she served as a vice president at the Center for American Progress.

— Justin Sink

Todd Park, U.S. chief technology officer

Todd Park is the top technology expert in the White House and advises the president and federal agencies on how best to use technologies. 

Silicon Valley praised President Obama when he created the position of CTO in 2009; Park is the second official to serve in the role. One of his top goals is to make more government data available to the public.

The botched launch of the ObamaCare website has thrust Park into the spotlight. The White House rejected a request from the House Oversight Committee to have Park testify at a hearing in early November, saying he was too busy trying to fix the site. After Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) issued a subpoena, Park agreed to appear before the panel.

Before becoming the White House CTO, Park served as CTO at the Department of Health and Human Services, where he worked on using data to improve healthcare systems.

— Brendan Sasso

Dan Pfeiffer, White House senior adviser

When campaign mastermind David Plouffe left his role at the White House after President Obama’s reelection, communications director-turned-senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer stepped into the role, helping to plot the West Wing’s moves and machinations. 

While it’s a challenge to fill the void left by Plouffe — “No one can take the place of David Plouffe,” as one former White House official put it — Pfeiffer is more than up to the task, his colleagues say. 

For one thing, Pfeiffer has been with Obama since he served as the communications director on the 2008 presidential campaign, and has a good understanding of his boss’s immediate and long-term goals. When Obama stood his ground on not negotiating with congressional Republicans over the government shutdown and debt ceiling, it was Pfeiffer who was the “relentless guardian” of the president’s stance, according to one senior administration official. 

“He’s been the most ferocious on that principle,” the senior administration official said. 

— Amie Parnes

Samantha Power, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations

A former reporter who received a Pulitzer Prize for a book examining genocide, Samantha Power is known around the globe as a tireless advocate for human rights.

In political circles, she’s remembered for calling Hillary Clinton a “monster” during the 2008 presidential campaign — a controversy she weathered to serve as an adviser to President Obama during his first term, when she often worked with Clinton.

In New York, Iran and Syria are among the foreign policy issues expected to dominate her time.

“I get to go to work every day and sit in front of the placard that says ‘United States’ as I try to promote American values and interests,” Power said. “Who could ask for a better job?”

— Justin Sink 

Ben Rhodes, deputy national security adviser for strategic communications

Ben Rhodes has been the president’s voice on the world stage ever since he helped craft then-Illinois Sen. Barack Obama’s first foreign-policy speech in April 2007. He’s had a hand in some of Obama’s most famous addresses around the world, including his Cairo speech to the Muslim world and his call for nuclear disarmament in Prague.

Since being promoted to deputy national security adviser in 2009, Rhodes has taken on a significant role in foreign policy decision-making, urging the president to abandon Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak and to intervene more actively in Syria.

A onetime aspiring fiction author, Rhodes got his start in politics on then-New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s 1997 reelection campaign; he later spent five years working for former Rep. Lee Hamilton (D-Ind.), helping to draft the 9/11 Commission and the Iraq Study Group reports.

— Julian Pecquet 

Susan Rice, national security adviser

Susan Rice has landed right at the president’s side as his national security adviser after getting passed over for her dream job as secretary of State in the fallout over the 2012 attack in Benghazi, Libya. The post has put her at the heart of the foreign policy challenges facing President Obama in his second term, including nuclear talks with Iran and the crisis in Syria.

A close Obama confidante who served as his senior foreign policy adviser during the 2008 presidential campaign, Rice is in charge of carrying out the president’s instructions to extricate the United States from the Middle East. 

After advocating for U.S. intervention in Libya as ambassador to the United Nations during Obama’s first term, she now finds herself seeking to avoid new military commitments in the region.

— Julian Pecquet

Miguel Rodriguez, White House director of legislative affairs 

In his second term, President Obama has been looking for willing partners across the aisle to push his agenda items. 

With a Congress seemingly more divided than ever, that means Miguel Rodriguez has his work cut out for him. But he’s certainly used to the pressure, according to those who know him. 

Rodriguez, 41, who previously served at the State Department as the deputy assistant secretary, where he oversaw Foggy Bottom’s ties to the Senate for Hillary Clinton, splits his time between the White House and Capitol Hill. He deals with everything from complaints from lawmakers down to the more mundane tasks like helping set up White House tours for members. 

Since he began heading up the office in February, he vividly recalls meeting with White House chief of staff Denis McDonough about a Capitol Hill charm offensive “purposefully,” with an eye towards improving White House relations with lawmakers and their aides. 

“It’s definitely a challenge,” Rodriguez said in an interview. “As we’ve tried to demonstrate, we’ll work with anyone who has good ideas.”

— Amie Parnes 

Eric Schultz, White House deputy press secretary

Call him the West Wing’s fireman. 

If there’s smoke coming from a fire, ranging from the latest problems with HealthCare.gov to government surveillance controversies, Eric Schultz is undoubtedly nearby. 

Schultz’s portfolio deals with the challenges of any given day. He was brought on in the spring of 2011 as associate communications director to deal with oversight — read: all things related to Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the House Overnight Committee chairman — when Republicans took over the House. But his role as the West Wing’s rapid-response guy has since expanded to include a large array of other prickly items.

Among his main responsibilities, Schultz, 33, who previously served as the communications director at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, is to proactively get out the White House perspective and President Obama’s reaction to various hot-button situations. 

Schultz, 33, says, “Our job is to get the most accurate information available to us out as soon as we are certain it’s reliable and complete. And push for a fair shake from the press.”

— Amie Parnes 

Howard Shelanski, Director of the Office ofManagement and Budget’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs

Howard Shelanski serves as the White House’s gatekeeper for the most important — and often most controversial — rules written within agencies across the federal government.

Shelanski was confirmed in June as administrator of the obscure but influential Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA). He comes to the post at a time when President Obama, faced with a starkly divided Congress, is increasingly looking to the regulatory system as a means to accomplish many of his policy goals.

The administration’s rule-making policies have sparked intense debate between public interest watchdogs that say the government is dragging its feet on important protections and business groups that complain the influx of new rules is stifling the economy.

In his brief tenure, Shelanski has won praise from both sides, both reducing an inherited backlog of rules under review at OIRA and pledging to expand the administration’s effort to get rid of overly burdensome regulations.

— Ben Goad

Wendy Sherman, Undersecretary of State for political affairs

The State Department’s third-ranking official is in the international spotlight as she seeks to deliver on President Obama’s bid for a diplomatic breakthrough with Iran. As the lead U.S. negotiator to the nuclear talks, Wendy Sherman must craft a deal that’s acceptable not only to the Iranians, but to a deeply skeptical Congress as well.

And that’s only part of her brief. Sherman’s role as the day-to-day manager of America’s bilateral and regional relations puts her in charge of seven bureaus, covering the whole world as well as U.S. policy towards international organizations.

A political appointee to a high-profile post usually held by career diplomats, Sherman was previously vice chairwoman of former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s international consulting firm. She served as counselor to President Clinton’s State Department from 1997 to 2001 and as his special adviser on North Korea.

— Julian Pecquet

David Simas, deputy senior communications adviser

David Simas was the polling ace on President Obama’s reelection team who helped manage the campaign’s impressive ground game. Returning to the White House earlier this year, the former chief of staff to Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (D) is now embroiled in the communications effort surrounding the attempts to fix HealthCare.gov. 

The shift contrasts greatly with Simas’s work ahead of Oct. 1, when he delivered a series of briefings touting what the White House believed would be ObamaCare’s groundbreaking and user-friendly enrollment site. The presentations were aimed at lawmakers, journalists and those working on Capitol Hill, and attempted to counter a rising Republican narrative that the system would not be ready. 

Now, Simas is presiding over the White House’s pivot toward the Medicaid expansion as the site continues to falter. Obama is pushing states like Texas and Louisiana to embrace the policy, which would cover millions of low-income people. “It is reckless that some governors are so determined to see that the healthcare law not succeed that they have even decided not to expand Medicaid coverage,” Simas recently told reporters. 

— Elise Viebeck

Todd Stern, deputy special envoy for climate change at the State Department

Todd Stern is the State Department’s top climate change diplomat at a crucial time.

He’s representing the United States in delicate United Nations-hosted talks aimed at crafting a binding global climate pact in 2015 that would take effect five years later.

Stern does vital spadework on the international front on a topic that’s getting fresh attention from the White House and is a signature priority for John Kerry, President Obama’s second-term secretary of State.

United Nations climate talks got a jolt in 2009 when Obama arrived in Copenhagen and helped salvage a modest interim agreement that prevented the process from collapsing.

Stern was a White House aide in the Clinton administration, working on international climate negotiations and other issues, and also did a stint at the Treasury Department.

Before joining the Obama administration, he was a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think with deep White House ties.

— Ben Geman

Larry Strickling, administrator, National Telecommunications and Information Administration

Larry Strickling advises the president on telecommunications and Internet policy issues.

Strickling has advised President Obama since his 2008 campaign and has served as the head of NTIA, a Commerce Department agency, since 2009. The agency is overseeing the construction of a nationwide high-speed wireless network for first responders, a main recommendation of the 9/11 Commission Report. The agency is also leading voluntary negotiations with Internet companies to establish stronger privacy protection standards.

Strickling is looking into ways to make federal agencies use the airwaves more efficiently so that more frequencies can be sold-off to help cellphone carriers meet skyrocketing demand for mobile data.

He was also a major voice in the White House’s decision to express concern with controversial legislation to crackdown on online piracy in 2012. A massive Web protest forced Congress to drop the bill.

— Brendan Sasso

Michael Taylor, food safety czar

Since coming to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2010 as the first-ever deputy commissioner for foods, Michael Taylor has been front and center in the agency’s transformation into a proactive agency that tracks and prevents foodborne illness outbreaks before people get sick. 

Taylor was brought on to the Obama administration in large part to help pass the Food Safety Modernization Act, which was signed into law in 2011. Now, as the country’s “food safety czar,” he’s the main man in charge of implementing the legislation.

He started his career as a staff attorney with the FDA, and also led the Department of Agriculture’s food safety service during the Clinton administration. 

But some liberal groups have criticized Taylor since he entered his current office, due to the three years he spent as vice president for public policy at the agricultural giant Monsanto.

— Julian Hattem

 

Shawn Turner, director of public affairs, Office of the Director of National Intelligence

Shawn Turner is responsible for coordinating messaging for the intelligence community’s 16 disparate agencies, meaning he’s had to defend the administration’s spy programs from critics foreign and domestic since the revelations of Edward Snowden.

Turner calls the debate about the spying programs important, but argues the national security implications involved cannot be ignored.

“It is equally important,” he says, “that we not lose sight of the fact that intelligence sheds light on the intentions of our adversaries and gives the president the information he needs to make informed nationals security decisions.”

A Cincinnati native, Turner’s escape is carpentry and woodworking; he’s currently building his daughters a backyard tree house — complete with a zip line.

— Justin Sink

 

 

Dan Utech, White House climate and energy adviser

Dan Utech will fill Heather Zichal’s shoes as top White House aide to President Obama on climate change and energy.

He takes over for Zichal, who left in mid-November, as the administration is devoting increased attention to climate change — and as Obama is facing an explosive decision on the Keystone XL oil pipeline.

Utech, who already worked on energy and climate at the White House Domestic Policy Council before he was tapped as a top adviser, will manage a climate change chessboard of sorts from the White House.

The sweeping White House second-term climate plan includes steps on the domestic and international front that involve a range of agencies.

Prior to coming to the White House, Utech advised then-Energy Secretary Steven Chu, and before that advised Hillary Clinton when she was in the Senate.

— Ben Geman

 

 

Michael Vickers, Undersecretary of Defense for intelligence

Michael Vickers has been President Obama’s key adviser inside the Pentagon for the administration’s covert war on terrorism. 

He first oversaw the U.S. military’s expanded role in those operations as the head of the Defense Department’s special operations division and later as Undersecretary of Defense for intelligence. 

During that time, Vickers was part of the military and intelligence team that planned and executed the killing of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in May 2011, arguably the greatest national security achievement of Obama’s presidency. 

A former Army special forces and CIA operations officer, Vickers also oversaw the dramatic rise in armed drone strikes and so-called “kill/capture” missions by U.S. special operations forces against al Qaeda, the Taliban and other militant extremist groups worldwide.

— Carlo Muñoz

 

Jeff Zients, ObamaCare website czar

Jeff Zients is one of Obama’s go-to problem solvers. 

The 46-year-old former business executive has spent the past four years shuffling around the bureaucratic hierarchy troubleshooting some of the federal government’s biggest challenges. 

More broadly, during his time at the White House’s budget office — including two stints as acting director — he focused on ways to eliminate inefficiencies across federal agencies. 

Zients has built a reputation as a behind-the-scenes guru who applies two decades of business experience to diagnose and solve government conundrums. 

His success has earned him what may be his toughest and most high-profile assignment yet. 

The president has asked him to lead the charge with fixing technical issues plaguing the ObamaCare website ahead of taking over as the administration’s chief economic adviser and director of the National Economic Council in January. 

Easing the anxiety of congressional Democrats, Zients has promised that the website will be fixed by the end of November. 

— Vicki Needham