CABINET NOMINEES
December 29, 2000

President-elect Bush announces four cabinet choices including Rod Paige as Education Secretary and Gov. Tommy Thompson to head Health and Human Services.

 

Online NewsHour Special Reports: The Bush/Cheney Transition Election 2000 Dec. 28, 2000: Donald Rumsfeld to head the Pentagon Dec. 20, 2000: Bush nominates to Treasury, Commerce, Agriculture and Housing and Urban Development Dec. 18, 2000: Bush makes picks for Secretary of State, National Security Adviser and White House Counsel     News for Students: The Bush/ Cheney Transition   The Official Bush/Cheney Transition Site	TERENCE SMITH: Joining me are three reporters who have covered extensively the nominees for Health and Human Services, Education, and Interior. John Nichols is a political reporter and editorial page editor at the Capital Times in Madison, Wisconsin. Kevin Bushweller is the assistant managing editor of Education Week, and Mark Obmascik is a political and environmental reporter for the Denver Post in Colorado. Welcome to you all.
	Thompson to head Health and Human Services
	John Nichols, you've been watching Governor Thompson for quite a while. What's the most important thing that the nation should know about Governor Thompson? JOHN NICHOLS: Probably the most important thing that the nation should know about the Governor is that he is a very able politician. He has a reputation in Washington as something of a policy wonk because he has been involved in areas such as welfare reform, school choice, some health care programs. But it is important to understand that he comes from a state that has not voted for a Republican for President since 1984, and yet he has won again and again overwhelmingly as a Republican running for Governor. He knows how to forge a lot of the bipartisan coalitions that Governor Bush, President-elect Bush, says he wants to make a principal part of his administration. TERENCE SMITH: There was a comment today that he has been preparing for this job all his life. Is that fair? JOHN NICHOLS: I don't know that that's true. I know that the Governor has said that he has devoted 35 years to this. The fact of the matter is that the governor is a man of government. He missed-- as I recall, he missed his law school graduation because he was already campaigning for a seat in the state legislature back in 1966. This is a man who has been an elected official since Lyndon Johnson was President. And he does enjoy governing. He enjoys making government work. And so to that extent, yes, he has been preparing. But to be honest, I think in his heart of hearts, he was probably preparing for the job that Governor Bush won this year. TERENCE SMITH: Indeed. I understand that the current secretary of HHS, Donna Shalala, in fact has some very kind words for him despite their political differences. JOHN NICHOLS: Well, even when you say political differences, there is a bit of a, I don't know, giggle on our part out here because the fact is they've worked very well. When the Governor first came into office, the University of Wisconsin was in kind of a transitional period. Not long afterwards around that time Donna Shalala came into leadership at the UW, and they worked very, very closely together here in Wisconsin. Then when Donna Shalala went to Washington, she and the Governor found a lot of overlapping areas of interest. In fact, it's notable that when Donna Shalala went to Washington for her confirmation hearings, to become secretary of HHS, Governor Thompson went with her and introduced her and spoke very highly of her. And she has volunteered, as the outgoing secretary, to go with Governor Thompson when he goes to his Senate confirmation hearings. So there's quite a relationship there that goes back a very long time. TERENCE SMITH: You know, the range of HHS is so huge, there are 300 different programs. I wonder what you expect he will focus on when he becomes, and assuming he does become secretary. JOHN NICHOLS: I think the Governor is extremely interested in the area of health care. And here in Wisconsin, while a big deal is made of his work in welfare reform, really the most monumental initiative that he launched was something called badger care, which was an effort to guarantee health care coverage to low-income families. And he really devoted a lot of attention to that, lobbied hard for exemptions at the federal level to make it happen. I think you are going to see Governor Thompson move very quickly, early on, to try and cobble together, if you will, some sort of health care initiatives that really do address the fact that 45 million Americans are without insurance at this point. TERENCE SMITH: Given his personality, and his experience, would you expect him to emerge as a dominant voice on domestic policy in the Bush cabinet? JOHN NICHOLS: There is no question that he will be a major player. I don't know exactly what his relationship with Governor Bush will be... Or President-elect Bush, we have to learn to call him that now… but I can tell you this: He has over the years had something of a mentoring role with Mr. Bush when Mr. Bush was Governor of Texas. Tommy Thompson is a close friend of former President George Bush -- has known the family for a long time and my suspicion is that his relationship with President Bush will be not exactly co-equals but one in which they are really are working on the same plane. I think you'll see Governor Thompson going up to Capitol Hill a lot and appearing before committees, speaking out in a lot of public forums very much with the imprimatur of the President's spokesman on these issues. And I suspect that the only challenge there is that Governor Thompson is a man who hasn't had a boss for a very long time, and he's going to have to walk that mine field kind of carefully. TERENCE SMITH: She is going to have one now. Thank you John Nichols very much.
	Paige selected for Education secretary
	TERENCE SMITH: Kevin Bushweller, Rod Paige, an interesting and well-known figure in education circles around the country. KEVIN BUSHWELLER: Absolutely. This is a man who is a passionate supporter of public schools but also one who believes firmly in the power of free market principles to drive school improvement. And I think you are going to see a lot of talk from him about how that can be done on a nationwide scale. He's opened 20 charter schools. There's a sort of small voucher experiment that's taking place in Houston, and accountability measures in Houston are very tough, especially with school administrators and teachers as well. TERENCE SMITH: And his roots with the Bush family -- they go back? KEVIN BUSHWELLER: His roots with the Bush family go back decades. In fact he was... he worked on the elder Bush's campaign when he was running for the Republican nomination in 1980 against Ronald Reagan. And then when Ronald Reagan tapped George Bush to be his running mate, and then they won the election, Paige was rewarded with a position on a national commission that looked at employment issues. TERENCE SMITH: How would you describe his politics? KEVIN BUSHWELLER: His politics are clearly conservative. This is a man who believes in pay for performance. And I'm talking about his education politics as well. He believes in charter schools. And I think he's a man who does not like the sort of traditional excuses for why poor kids cannot do well in school. He really does believe that if certain parameters are set up, that any kid can succeed. TERENCE SMITH: You mentioned his support for vouchers. So would we now assume that there will be a voucher program put forward and that he will be the spokesman for it? KEVIN BUSHWELLER: I'm not sure we can assume that at this point. That's a real hot political issue. And I think for Rod Paige to go out there and push that too hard, too fast, could really backfire in the education community. I think what you'll see Rod Paige push are some of the things that President-elect Bush was pushing during the campaign such as holding schools accountable for the federal money that they use. Paige does that in his own district, and I think you'll see him pushing for that more at the federal level as well, to show results for that money that the federal government gives to schools. TERENCE SMITH: A Cabinet Secretary has to build a consensus for programs, has to deal with the White House. Is this something Rod Paige is going to be well suited to do? KEVIN BUSHWELLER: I think that's a good question. And I think time will tell. But his experience as a school board member, I think, helped him develop an ability to work with people who he disagreed with, to come to some kind of consensus on things. I think he also had to do that as superintendent of the Houston schools: There were a lot of different constituencies he had to bring together, the Hispanic constituency, the African American constituency, and by and large they have been happy with what he's done. However, you know, when I met this man in 1994, he was a man who was anxious for action and results. And I think that's something that will be interesting to see how he deals with that in Washington because Washington isn't necessarily known for action and results. And that's something again. TERENCE SMITH: So it may test his patience. KEVIN BUSHWELLER: I think it could test his patience, absolutely. TERENCE SMITH: Okay. Kevin, thank you very much.
	Norton for Interior secretary
	TERENCE SMITH: Mark Obmascik, out in Denver, you know a good deal about Gale Norton. What can you tell us about her? MARTIN OBMASCIK: Well, she is a protégé of James Watt, who came out of the Mountain States Legal Foundation, which is a conservative anti-Washington group. She then went to Washington and worked in the Reagan administration for both the Department of Agriculture and then the Department of Interior where she handled as a lawyer a lot of the same issues that she'll probably be handling now. She kind of came out of nowhere in 1990 to win the attorney general's job here in Colorado. There was... the incumbent was a man who had just switched parties. And she ran as the tough on crime candidate and defeated him. Her campaign was bankrolled almost entirely by one single oil millionaire from Denver and won office and was reelected in 1998. She did try to run for the U.S. Senate in Colorado, but was defeated by a man, by a Congressman who ran as the more conservative candidate. TERENCE SMITH: You mentioned her association with James Watt. Are we to assume that she shares his politics? MARTIN OBMASCIK: I don't think so. I think that at least the way she describes herself is more of a libertarian with a small "l", not a capital "l." But she is very skeptical of large government, and there's kind of a... It is an unusual fit for her -- for someone who is a libertarian. In the West we do a strange dance, a Western two-step. The first step is we bash the federal government in the stomach and say leave us alone. And then we hold out our hand and ask for federal money, we look for subsidies for things like water or timbering or mining. She herself is going to have to rectify those two positions of someone who believes in more of a self-reliant, independent attitude that's traditionally associated with the West versus the way that the Interior Secretary's job traditionally has been which is doling out subsidies to each of the old western extractive industries. TERENCE SMITH: In fact, Bruce Babbitt, another westerner, the current Interior Secretary, broke his pick on those very issues, trying to get more money for grazing and lumbering and mining on federal lands. Would you expect Gale Norton to pursue that? MARTIN OBMASCIK: It is hard to say. There is a stalemate out here. Babbitt did come in and try to wean the West from it dependence on subsidies. He got accused of waging a war on the West, really upset a lot of the Senate Republicans, and that ended as a stalemate. But politicians follow the public, and I think the public, especially in the West, is a little unclear on this. Rural westerners really see an end of below cost timber sales and grazing subsidies, they really see that as a threat to their life. If you look at some of the census numbers that came out this week, the interior West, Rocky Mountain West where the Interior Department has so much of this land is really one of the most urbanized sections of the United States. People tend to live in cities here, and it's really... it is a tricky balance for her politically. TERENCE SMITH: You heard her very careful answer on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Do you imagine that we'll see drilling there? MARTIN OBMASCIK: Well, when she worked in the Reagan administration as a lawyer, she did work in support of drilling for ANWAR, but part of the thing that is tricky with her record is so much of it involves her own work as a lawyer where she is working on behalf of a client. So her own personal views on these issues are still a little hard to tell. TERENCE SMITH: All right. And of course the client now will be the United States. Thank you very much

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