CNN
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Kamala Harris filed paperwork Monday morning to start planning for a possible presidential transition – an ordinary transfer for a non-incumbent candidate but in addition one other measure of her rushed marketing campaign launch.
Former President Donald Trump introduced his personal transition committee final week.
To guide the hassle, CNN has discovered that Harris is tapping the identical one who ran the method for Joe Biden 4 years in the past: Yohannes Abraham, the present Indonesia-based US ambassador to the Affiliation of Southeast Asian Nations.
Abraham and Harris labored collectively carefully on the final transition after which when he was the primary chief of employees to the Nationwide Safety Council underneath Biden.
Abraham is not going to begin the transition work till he leaves the State Division. He’s anticipated to depart his ambassador job quickly and transfer again to Washington.
Abraham, who didn’t reply when contacted by CNN for remark, has earned reward for the job he’s abandoning.
“Yohannes is considered one of our greatest,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken stated on a go to to Laos on the finish of July. “When he picks up the telephone, Washington listens, in no small half as a result of he was on the opposite aspect of the road in Washington himself.”
The Harris transition operation might be hiring different employees, with Covington & Burling LLP – the regulation agency of former Legal professional Normal Eric Holder, which ran the running mate vetting process for the Democratic nominee – serving to advise how greatest to arrange the hassle.
The aim of a transition committee is to ease any new administration taking management of the large federal authorities, put together senior aides for jobs and constructions they might not be aware of and facilitate a smoother transition for whoever is sworn in at midday on January 20, 2025.
However it’s a difficult steadiness for Harris, who’s operating as each an extension of Biden’s administration and a recent begin. An individual aware of the vp’s planning advised CNN that the transition equipment is not going to be making personnel choices earlier than the election. It additionally is not going to have a task in policymaking for Harris, which stays the area of the vp’s workplace and the marketing campaign. Harris was dealing with a deadline of subsequent week to file the transition paperwork.
The particular person additionally added that, as with the transition processes run by Biden and by Barack Obama in 2008, “this transition equipment will deal with operational issues within the pre-election interval, reminiscent of ensuring that ample vetting capability exists post-election.”
Finally, the transition committee for the profitable candidate will develop into the nexus for all the pieces from selecting Cupboard secretaries to hiring for lower-level jobs to getting arms round info and main choices that may face the brand new president.