Obama names six OMB officials
Positions filled include executive associate director and associate director for general government programs.
President-elect Barack Obama today announced six political appointees to the Office of Management and Budget.
Jeffrey Liebman will be executive associate director at OMB. Liebman is currently a professor of public policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. He teaches courses in public-sector economics and American economic policy.
Xavier de Souza Briggs will be associate director for general government programs at OMB. Souza Briggs is associate professor of sociology and urban planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In government, he led the Clinton administration’s urban policy research and development unit at the Housing and Urban Development Department, where he dealt with affordable housing and economic development issues.
Steve Kosiak was named associate director for defense and international affairs at OMB. Kosiak is currently vice president for budget studies at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments and is a professor for the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University.
Robert Gordon will be associate director for education, income maintenance and labor at OMB. Gordon is a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, where he focuses on education and domestic policy.
Preeta Bansal will be general counsel and senior policy advisor at OMB. Bansal is currently a partner at the Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom law firm in New York.
Kenneth Baer will be associate director for communications and strategic planning at OMB. Baer has led Baer Communications, a speechwriting and policy consulting firm, for the past eight years.