Obama picks Daschle to head HHS

Tom Daschle will become Secretary of Health and Human Services.

President-elect Barack Obama has chosen former Sen. Tom Daschle to be Secretary of Health and Human Services, and the former Senate majority leader has indicated he wants the job, three sources close to the transition told CNN Wednesday.


The sources said that Daschle negotiated that he will also serve as the White House health "czar," or point person, so that he will report directly to the incoming president.

By wearing two hats, Daschle -- not White House staffers -- will be writing the health care plan that Obama submits to Congress next year.

The sources said the precise timing of the announcement has not been worked out, but Daschle is likely to officially join the Obama transition team as the lead adviser on health issues in the next few weeks.

An Obama transition official would not comment.

Daschle is currently billed as a "special public policy adviser" in the Washington office of the lobbying firm Alston Bird, though he is technically not a federally registered lobbyist.

But his wife, Linda Daschle, is a registered lobbyist at the powerful firm Baker Donelson, which does have some clients in health-related fields.

Meanwhile, critics questioned whether Obama's top staff picks so far represent the "change" that he promised during the campaign.

More than half of the people named so far to Obama's transition or staff posts have ties to former President Bill Clinton's administration.

The Clinton-heavy team has caused some Republicans to question Obama's call for change.

"I think several individuals are very frustrated to think that President-elect Obama may just cut and paste from some of the Democratic operatives from the Clinton administration and put them into his White House," said Leslie Sanchez, a Republican strategist and CNN contributor.

Republicans aren't the only ones who want Obama to branch out. Robert Kuttner, a liberal and author of "Obama's Challenge," says the president-elect should broaden his recruiting efforts.

"It's not as if the only competent people who ever served in government or who are capable are serving in government are veterans of the Clinton administration, so he's got to be careful how many Clintonistas he appoints to top level government posts," Kuttner said.

Before Clinton, however, Democrats had not been in the White House since Jimmy Carter, and many of those in Carter's administration are too old to serve again under Obama.

Lanny Davis, President Clinton's former special council, lobbied publicly for Obama to choose Sen. Hillary Clinton as his running mate during the campaign. Despite what critics say, Davis says real change is about policy, not people.

"What this conversation is about is laughable if you ask people in America what they care about. They care about the economy, jobs, education, health care. They don't care about whether somebody who fills a particular box is from a prior administration," he said.

The Obama transition team said in a statement that they are dedicated to building a well-rounded administration.

"President-elect Obama is committed to putting together a competent team that is diverse in many ways, including experience. Serving in high level positions whether in government, in the private sector or in public service is seen as a positive," spokesman Nick Shapiro said.

Among the so-called "Clintonistas" is the former president's wife, who is widely considered the frontrunner to be the next secretary of state.

Obama last week asked Sen. Clinton if she would consider taking on the post, multiple sources told CNN. Her response is expected this week.

Observers say President Clinton could pose an obstacle to his wife's becoming secretary of state, given his extensive international business dealings and global foundation.

The former president has agreed to release the names of several major donors to his charitable foundation and will submit future foundation activities and paid speeches to a strict ethics review, according to a source with knowledge of the discussions.

Clinton also would step away from day-to-day responsibility for his foundation and would alert the State Department to his speaking schedule and any new sources of income, should his wife become the secretary of state, the source said. That move could smooth Sen. Clinton's path to the new job.

Obama's latest selection -- Eric Holder -- also has ties to Clinton. Sources told CNN on Wednesday that Obama offered Holder the position of attorney general.

Holder served in the Clinton administration as deputy attorney general,

Rahm Emanuel, the incoming White House chief of staff, is a former top aide to President Clinton.

And Peter Orszag, the head of the Congressional Budget Office, was picked to head Obama's Office of Management and Budget, a top Democratic source told CNN on Tuesday. Orszag worked at the Clinton White House as special assistant to the president at the National Economic Council and served on the Council of Economic Advisers.

There's been little word on how the president-elect's transition team is going about business in the Pentagon, but that is because they are under strict orders not to talk to the news media, according to a senior Pentagon official who has been interacting with the transition team.

The reason is that there still is no signed Memorandum of Understanding, an agreement between the Bush administration and President-elect Obama's transition team that spells out who is allowed access to classified information and what degree of classified information that are allowed to see, sources say. Once that is done, Pentagon officials expect the pace of transition planning to pick up.