Biden chooses longtime adviser Ron Klain as chief of staff
WASHINGTON — President-elect Joe Biden has chosen his longtime adviser Ron Klain to reprise his role as his chief of staff, installing an aide with decades of experience in the top role in his White House.
Klain will lead a White House likely to be consumed by the response to the coronavirus pandemic, which continues to spread unchecked across the nation, and he’ll face the challenge of working with a divided Congress that could include a Republican-led Senate. Klain served as the coordinator to the Ebola response during the 2014 outbreak.
In a statement Wednesday night, Biden suggested he chose Klain for the position because his longtime experience in Washington had prepared him for such challenges.
“His deep, varied experience and capacity to work with people all across the political spectrum is precisely what I need in a White House chief of staff as we confront this moment of crisis and bring our country together again,” Biden said.
Klain served as chief of staff for Biden during Barack Obama’s first term, was chief of staff to Vice President Al Gore in the mid-1990s and was a key adviser on the Biden campaign, guiding Biden’s debate preparations and coronavirus response. He’s known and worked with Biden since the Democrat’s 1987 presidential campaign.
Biden’s plea for cooperation confronts a polarized Congress
WASHINGTON — President-elect Joe Biden feels at home on Capitol Hill, but the place sure has changed since he left.
The clubby atmosphere that Biden knew so well during his 36-year Senate career is gone, probably forever. Deal-makers are hard to find. And the election results haven’t dealt him a strong hand to pursue his legislative agenda, with Democrats’ poor performance in down-ballot races likely leaving them without control of Congress.
The dynamic leaves Biden with little choice but to try to govern from the vanishing middle of a Washington that’s been badly ruptured by the tumult of the last decade. With the forces of partisanship and gridlock entrenched, ending what Biden called the “grim era of demonization” could be the central challenge of his presidency — and one that could prove vexing if forces on the left and right refuse to go along.
“There is a certain opportunity for bipartisanship, but it is all going to be deals in the middle,” said Rohit Kumar, a former aide to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. “What I don’t know is whether the (Democratic and Republican) parties will allow them to do that because the parties have gotten a lot more polarized.”
While it is not settled, Biden faces a high likelihood of becoming the first Democrat in modern history to assume office without his party controlling Congress. Republicans are favored to retain control of the Senate heading into two runoff elections in Georgia in January. Democrats have already won the House.
Peru ouster throws nation’s anti-corruption drive into doubt
LIMA, Peru — When Peru’s legislature voted President Martín Vizcarra from office this week, they may have done more than just oust a popular leader — they likely put the country’s best chance at making a dent on endemic corruption on hold.
The chief of state had emerged as the country’s most vocal proponent in pushing through measures to end decades of dirty politics. Vizcarra dissolved Congress last year after lawmakers repeatedly stonewalled efforts to curb graft and reform the judiciary. More recently, he tried to get rid of their right to parliamentary immunity.
He may not have succeeded in pushing through major change — and is now under scrutiny for his own possible misconduct — but many Peruvians saw Vizcarra as the leader of a still nascent drive to hold the powerful accountable. Furious at his removal Monday, thousands have taken to the streets daily in protest, refusing to recognize the new government.
“From the political point of view, he was the face of the resistance,” said Alonso Gurmendi Dunkelberg, an analyst and assistant professor at Peru’s Universidad del Pacifico. “I think we will not see much anti-corruption efforts in this Congress.”
In a region where graft is common, Peru has gone further than most Latin American countries in recent years in investigating high-ranking leaders.