Biden expected to nominate Shalanda Young for budget chief

President Biden will nominate Shalanda Young on Wednesday as director of the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), The Washington Post reported Tuesday evening, citing three unidentified sources. 

Young has served as the acting budget director for months after being confirmed in a 63-37 vote. 

She would be the first woman of color to lead the office if confirmed. 

Young has support from both sides of the aisle, the Post noted, adding that she was not nominated earlier because some Democrats wanted to see more people of Asian descent promoted in the administration. 

The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal later reported that Biden plans to nominate Young.

The Journal also reported that the White House has plans to nominate Nani Coloretti to serve as OMB’s deputy director. She served as deputy secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development in the Obama administration, and is currently serving as senior vice president for financial and business strategy at the Urban Institute.

Biden’s last pick to be OMB director, Neera Tanden, withdrew her nomination amid bipartisan criticism after posts made while she led a think tank resurfaced.  

She compared Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to Voldemort and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to a vampire, while also suggesting that Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) benefited from Russian hacking in the 2016 presidential election. A number of those tweets have since been deleted.

Tanden apologized for the controversial tweets in two confirmation hearings, but her contrition was not enough to assuage concerns from a number of senators. Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.), one of the Democratic lawmakers who opposed her confirmation, cited the need for comity.

She has since been chosen to serve as White House staff secretary.

The Hill has reached out to the White House for comment.

Biden’s pick for the top spot at OMB comes amid a busy time for the administration’s legislative agenda. The president signed a $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package last week, and Democratic lawmakers and White House officials are now working to finalize and pass the party’s roughly $2 trillion social spending and climate package.

— Updated at 7:53 a.m.