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Obama Names Sebelius, DeParle to Key Health Posts
White House Health Summit Thursday
MARCH 3, 2009
By LAURA MECKLER
WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama named a former Clinton administration official to head his White House Office for Health Reform, handing a veteran policy expert the task of helping to steer one of his biggest policy initiatives.
The announcement of Nancy-Ann DeParle came Monday afternoon when he introduced Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius as his choice for secretary of Health and Human Services. (See the White House's statement.)
Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle was to wear both hats in the Obama administration before he was forced to pull out amid controversy over late paid taxes. The dual announcements were highly anticipated since Mr. Daschle pulled out a month ago, and they kick off a week of White House attention to health care.
On Thursday, Mr. Obama will host a White House summit on how to overhaul the health-care system, with some 120 invited members of Congress, lobbyists for various interest groups and some regular Americans gathering to discuss the road forward. "We're starting the discussion with everyone in the room," said Jenny Backus, an HHS spokeswoman.
"If we are going to help families, save businesses, and improve the long-term economic health of our nation, we must realize that fixing what's wrong with our health care system is no longer just a moral imperative, but a fiscal imperative. Health care reform that reduces costs while expanding coverage is no longer just a dream we hope to achieve -- it's a necessity we have to achieve," Mr. Obama said in a statement Monday.
During the Clinton administration, from 1997 to 2000, Ms. DeParle headed the Health Care Financing Agency, the branch of HHS that ran Medicare and Medicaid, and before that, she worked at the Office of Management and Budget. From 2002-2008, she served as a member of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, which advises Congress on Medicare issues. From 1987 to 1989, she served as the Tennessee Commissioner of Human Services, and she has also worked as an attorney in private practice.
Ms. DeParle is now a managing director at the private equity firm, CCMP Capital. She also serves on corporate boards including Boston Scientific Corp.
Jeanne Lambrew, a longtime health-care expert, had already been named deputy director of the White House office. It was unclear whether she will remain in that post.
Mr. Daschle had insisted on taking both the HHS and the White House jobs, arguing that it is too easy for the HHS secretary to be out of the loop on a major initiative that is driven by the White House. That was largely the case with Donna Shalala, President Bill Clinton's HHS secretary, who found herself eclipsed by the White House. Before his withdrawal, she praised the decision to give both jobs to Mr. Daschle.
"It's exactly what you need to do because you have to control all parts of it with a single person in charge," she said in an interview in December. "I think they've learned from our mistakes and made exactly the right decision."
But that was an arrangement made especially for Mr. Daschle, who had considerable experience in Washington and expertise in health policy. Gov. Sebelius is a more traditional HHS choice, having garnered her health experience at the state level--as a governor and, before that, as a two-term state insurance commissioner.
Thursday's health care summit is meant to formally kick off the administration's push for health legislation, following an address to Congress and a budget release last week where the president emphasized his commitment to action this year.
While the summit will be open to media coverage, various interest groups have been meeting privately for months to try to hash through some of the issues that are expected to surround a health-care overhaul. One large group meets in the office of Sen. Edward Kennedy (D., Mass.); another convened with the help of an outside mediator.
On Sunday, administration officials reaffirmed their desire to push forward with health-care reform, a major legislative task that will require agreement among various parties over how to set up a new system to cover uninsured Americans, and how to pay for it.
Mr. Obama's budget plan, which was unveiled last week, proposed paying for the initiative with a combination of cuts to government health spending and a new limit on tax deductions available to upper-income Americans. White House budget director Peter Orszag said Sunday that he wants to see the effort offset with tax increases or spending cuts so it doesn't add to the deficit.
"We're going to get health-care reform done this year. I think this [budget] proposal will get enacted," he said on ABC News's "This Week." "But if it -- if it doesn't, then we're going to need to come up with some other offset."
Beyond funding, the proposal contains numerous other controversial elements that are likely to come under debate, including whether businesses should be required to provide insurance to workers and whether Americans should be required to sign up for insurance. A Democratic proposal to set up a public program to compete with private health-insurance companies is also controversial.
As a candidate, Mr. Obama endorsed a new requirement for large businesses to offer workers health insurance, rejected a mandate for individuals to buy it, and supported a new government-run health plan. But he isn't expected to weigh in on these issues Thursday, and he plans to take few public positions on the matter as Congress begins work on health care, preferring to help shape legislation behind the scenes.
Next up for the Senate will be confirmation hearings for Gov. Sebelius, who was a two-term state insurance commissioner before becoming governor. She is fiercely opposed by anti-abortion activists contending that she was too supportive of George Tiller, who performs late-term abortions at his Wichita clinic.
Asked last week about the abortion controversy, Gov. Sebelius said in a statement: "As governor of Kansas, I have worked hard on a range of initiatives that have resulted in abortions [in Kansas] declining more than 10% in the last six years."
An administration official said any candidate Mr. Obama picked was going to support abortion rights, and that nothing in Gov. Sebelius's record on the issue was of concern.
Others welcomed news of her nomination. "Gov. Sebelius is a strong choice for health and human services secretary," said Sen. Max Baucus (D., Mont.), chairman of the Finance Committee, which will consider her nomination. "Passing comprehensive health-care reform is an absolute imperative this year, and as a former insurance commissioner, Gov. Sebelius really gets what needs to be done."
Write to Laura Meckler at laura.meckler@wsj.com
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