Bush Adds Four To Cabinet
President-elect George W. Bush on Friday added four more names to his almost completed Cabinet, including Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson as his choice for secretary of health and human services.
At a morning news conference at his Washington transition headquartes, Bush said "Tommy has been a creative, conservative, compassionate governor of Wisconsin."
"Real welfare reform began in Wisconsin," Bush said.
Thompson, appearing alongside Bush, called his nomination "a humbling honor and an incredible challenge, a challenge that I will embrace enthusiastically and with great passion."
Bush also named Rod Paige, the Houston superintendent of schools, to be secretary of education; former Colorado Attorney General Gale Norton to be secretary of the interior; and Anthony Principi to be secretary of veterans' affairs, the department in which he once served as deputy.
The four Cabinet appointments left only three slots to be filled after the New Year – the secretaries of labor, energy and transportation. Bush has said that he hopes to announce his remaining selections by the end of next week.
| The Bush Team, So Far... AGRICULTURE SECRETARY: Ann Veneman, former California agriculture director ATTORNEY GENERAL: Sen. John Ashcroft, R-Mo. COMMERCE SECRETARY: Bush campaign chairman Don Evans DEFENSE SECRETARY: Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld EDUCATION SECRETARY: Rod Paige, Houston schools superintendant ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY DIRECTOR: New Jersey Gov. Christie Whitman HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES SECRETARY: Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson HOUSING SECRETARY: Mel Martinez, chief executive, Orange County, Fla. INTERIOR SECRETARY: Former Colorado Attorney General Gale Norton NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Stanford University scholar Condoleezza Rice OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET: Mitch Daniels, executive, Eli Lilly and Co. SECRETARY OF STATE: Retired Gen. Colin Powell TREASURY SECRETARY: Paul O'Neill, chairman, Alcoa Inc. VETERANS' AFFAIRS SECRETARY: Former Deputy VA Secretary Anthony Prinicipi WHITE HOUSE COUNSEL: Alberto R. Gonzales, Texas Supreme Court justice WHITE HOUSE COUNSELOR: Campaign spokeswoman Karen Hughes. |
Thompson, in his fourth term in Wisconsin, is the nation's longest-serving Republican governor, and was an early leader in the reform movement to cut welfare rolls.
Since 1986, when Thompson first was elected governor, the number of welfare families in Wisconsin has fallen from more than 98,000 to just over 16,000.
Thompson, 59, will head one of the government's largest departments, one that comprises the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, among other agencies.
HS also oversees the Medicare and Medicaid health insurance programs for elderly, disabled and poor people, and the Head Start program for children. And it provides financial assistance to low-income families.
Paige, the nominee for secretary of education, is widely credited with making the Houston district, the largest in Texas and seventh largest in the nation, one of the country's finest urban school districts. He becomes the second black member of the Bush Cabinet; the other is Secretary of State-designate Colin Powell.
Norton, Bush's choice for interior, served as Colorado's attorney general from 1991-1999, the first woman in the state's history to hold that office. A pro-choice Republican, she leans on the conservative side on environmental and economic issues.
A combat-decorated Vietnam War veteran, Principi served as deputy secretary of veterans affairs in former President George Bush's administration.
On Thursday, Bush named Donald Rumsfeld to be his secretary of defense, returning to the Pentagon a man who held the job in the aftermath of the Vietnam War.
The surprise announcement, a Rumsfeld reprise after 25 years, fills a vacancy that had been the object of intense speculation since Bush was reported to be on the verge of choosing a former Indiana senator to take it.
Rumsfeld, 68, is a veteran of four Republican administrations, dating back to Richard Nixon's time. From 1975-77, he served as secretary of defense under President Gerald Ford.
"He is going to be a great secretary of defense – again," Bush said.
While he chose an old Pentagon hand to return to the job, Bush said he wants Rumsfeld to modernize the military to face a new generation of threats. "We are in a new national security environment," said Bush. "We do need to be arranged to deal with the new threats, not the old ones."
The president-elect also said he would ask Congress for more money to develop a missile defense system and for a military pay raise.
At a separate transition briefing Thursday, spokesman Ari Fleischer announced his own appointment, saying Bush had chosen him to be White House press secretary.
Rumsfeld rounds out Bush's national security team. Bush said he has assembled "a team of fairly strong smart people" in Secretary of State-designate Colin Powell, national security adviser Condeleezza Rice and Rumsfeld, along with Cheney, a former secretary of defense.
Bush is having a harder tough time living up to his implied vow to include at least one Democrat in his Cabinet. He said he had talked to some Democrats in Congress about leaving their current positions to join his administration, but "most people want to stay in place."
Republican sources said Rep. Ralph Hall, a Texas Democrat, was one of those still under consideration for energy secretary, and former Democratic Rep. Lee Hamilton of Indiana could be a candidate for U.N. ambassador.
The presidet-elect left Washington for Texas after Friday's announcement, and aides said he would remain home in Austin through mid-January. Though he resigned as governor last week, he has a loose agreement with new Gov. Rick Perry to remain in the governor's mansion until Jan. 16.