Exclusive: Obama to renominate Republican to nuclear panel
By Jeff Mason and Roberta Rampton
WASHINGTON | Thu Apr 19, 2012 12:06pm EDT
reuters.com
(Reuters) - President Barack Obama will renominate Republican Kristine Svinicki to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, defying opposition from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a White House official told Reuters on Thursday.
Republicans want Svinicki, whose term as a commissioner expires in June, to stay on the panel and believe the process is being held up because she, along with three other commission members, accused the current NRC chairman, a Democrat, of bullying women.
"The president will renominate her," a White House official said. "Expect the official nomination to happen in the coming days."
Reid, a Democrat, vehemently opposes Svinicki, saying she is too close to the nuclear industry she regulates and does not deserve the job.
Svinicki is speaking in Africa about nuclear safety and could not be reached for comment.
A vacancy could cause gridlock along party lines at the commission and delay safety reforms at U.S. nuclear plants that the NRC ordered after last year's disaster at Japan's Fukushima nuclear power plant.
ACCUSATIONS FLY
Republicans are rallying behind Svinicki as they try to improve their ratings among female voters in the run-up to the November 6 presidential election.
The move by the Democratic president may be seen as a rare gesture of bipartisanship in an election year. Relations between the White House and congressional Republicans are tense after months of bruising standoffs over budget and deficit issues.
The move is also a sign of the importance the White House places on the work of the NRC.
Last year, Svinicki and the three other commissioners at the commission - two Democrats, two Republicans - took the unprecedented step of complaining to the White House about the management style of Gregory Jaczko, the NRC chairman.
Their concerns were made public in December during hearings on Capitol Hill, where the commissioners accused Jaczko - a former Reid staffer - of berating senior women NRC staff members, bringing them to tears in front of others.
Jaczko has denied the accusations.
Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell delivered a second speech in two days about Svinicki on Thursday.
"The only reason we're even talking about Kristine Svinicki right now is because she had the courage to stand up to a hostile work environment, and to the bully who was responsible for it," he said.
Other Democrats are expected to join Reid in raising complaints about Svinicki.
"Senator Reid opposes Commissioner Svinicki's renomination because she lied to Congress about her past work on Yucca Mountain," Adam Jentleson, a spokesman for Reid, said in a statement.
Senator Barbara Boxer, chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, believes Svinicki should be replaced and has accused her of being misleading during a 2007 confirmation hearing about the extent of her work on the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump.
"Senator Boxer believes that in this post-Fukushima-era, Ms. Svinicki should be replaced by someone who has demonstrated a clear commitment to safety first," a statement provided by the committee said.
Svinicki maintains she did not mischaracterize the extent of her work on Yucca during her time at the Energy Department, but Boxer has said technical reports authored by Svinicki seem to show she was deeply involved with the project.
The nuclear waste dump had been proposed for Nevada but was opposed by Reid and killed by the Obama administration.
Reid has portrayed Jaczko as a target of criticism because he sought industry safety reforms following the Fukushima disaster.
(Editing by David Brunnstrom)
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