Biden’s pick for key members of Economic and Jobs Team
Biden’s picks for Economic teams
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| Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo was named Thursday as President-elect Joe Biden's intended nominee for secretary of the U.S. Commerce Department, which oversees the Census Bureau. Jonathan Wiggs/Boston Globe via Getty Images. |
Governor Gina Raimondo is nominated as secretary of Commerce
Currently serving her second term as the 75th Governor of Rhode Island — the first woman to hold the position — she is known as an effective and innovative executive whose strong management brought her state back from what was, at the time she first ran for Governor, the worst unemployment rate of any state in the nation.
A champion of creative, forward-thinking economic initiatives, Governor Raimondo launched successful workforce training programs to prepare Americans for the 21st century economy. Her small business loan fund has empowered 150 Rhode Island entrepreneurs so far — more than half of whom are women or people of color — to get new businesses up and running.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has worked to quickly bring the state economy back from the depths of the nationwide crisis. Governor Raimondo has expanded clean energy jobs and put Rhode Island on a path to achieving 100% renewable energy. She will be a key player in helping position the United States as an exporter of 21st century products and leader in the clean energy economy.
As commerce secretary, Raimondo would take over the position from Wilbur Ross, a Trump appointee who has been found in contempt of Congress by the House for defying a subpoena to turn over documents about the Trump administration's efforts to add a citizenship question to census forms, according to NPR.
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| Don Graves is a long-time trusted advisor to President-elect Joe Biden. |
Don Graves, Deputy Secretary of Commerce
Don Graves is a long-time trusted advisor to President-elect Joe Biden who has served as Deputy Assistant to President Barack Obama and Counselor to then-Vice President Biden, Executive Director of the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, and Deputy Assistant Secretary for Small Business, Community Development and Housing Policy at the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
During the Obama-Biden Administration, he oversaw the multi-billion-dollar Small Business Lending Fund and State Small Business Credit Initiative, as well as the Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI) Fund — and led the federal effort to revitalize Detroit in the wake of its bankruptcy, working with city, state, business, non-profit and community stakeholders to bring the city back from the brink. In 2016, he was tasked by then-Vice President Biden to oversee his signature Cancer Moonshot Effort. He is a deeply experienced, tested public servant who has focused on creating jobs, opportunity, and prosperity for all Americans, especially in underserved communities.
Graves currently leads the Biden-Harris Transition’s Treasury Agency Review Team to ensure the Department of Treasury is ready to hit the ground running on day one. Prior to his role on the Biden-Harris transition, Graves was Head of Corporate Responsibility & Community Relations at KeyBank, leading the bank’s sustainability work. He received his B.A. degree in political science and history from Williams College and Juris Doctor from the Georgetown University Law Center.
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| Governor of Rhode Island Gina Raimondo speaks onstage during Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit in 2015. PAUL MORIGI/GETTY IMAGES. |
Isabel Guzman to be Agency Executive of Small Business Administration
Ms. Guzman was a senior official at the SBA during the Obama administration, serving as deputy chief of staff, WSJ reported.
If confirmed, Ms. Guzman would lead an agency that is best known for its loan programs to provide small firms with capital and has more recently helped businesses affected by the pandemic. Many of the agency’s loan programs rely on partnerships with banks and other financial institutions, which issue the loans and receive an SBA guarantee.
Isabel Guzman currently serves as the Director of the Office of the Small Business Advocate within the California Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz).
A lifelong proponent of small businesses, Guzman grew up as the daughter of a small business owner and served within the Obama-Biden Administration as Deputy Chief of Staff and Senior Advisor in the U.S. Small Business Administration. In her current role, Guzman helps connect entrepreneurs in every community with the resources and capital needed for success, and supports small businesses to weather the COVID-19 pandemic.
She serves as the voice of small businesses and innovative startups to help them access capital, markets and networks. In addition to overseeing a network of small business centers, Guzman’s office has launched the Shop Safe Shop Local initiative aimed at helping small businesses reopen safely, and its Get Digital CA initiative to help businesses adopt technology to safely and successfully operate in the pandemic.
Prior to her career in public service, Guzman was a small business entrepreneur herself, an advisor to fellow founders, and an advisor at ProAmérica Bank, the first California-chartered Latino-formed business bank to form in Los Angeles in over 35 years. She earned a Bachelor of Science from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business.
The agency, created in 1953, also offers programs to help small businesses win federal contracting opportunities and funds local centers where entrepreneurs receive counseling, technical assistance and other support. Through its Office of Advocacy, the SBA also aims to advance small-business interests throughout the federal government.
The relatively small bureaucracy played a key role in the federal government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. The SBA administered the popular Paycheck Protection Program, which provided coronavirus aid in the form of forgivable loans to small businesses, nonprofits and self-employed entrepreneurs.
| BUILD BACK BETTER: JOE BIDEN’S JOBS AND ECONOMIC RECOVERY PLAN FOR WORKING FAMILIES Joe Biden believes to his core that there’s no greater economic engine in the world than the hard work and ingenuity of the American people. Nobody has more respect for the working women and men who get up every day to build and sustain this country, or more confidence that they can meet the challenges we face, Joe Biden's presidential campaign introduced. Make no mistake: America has been knocked down. The unemployment rate is higher than it was in the Great Recession. Millions have lost jobs, hours, pay, health care, or the small business they started, through no fault of their own. The pandemic has also laid bare some unacceptable truths. Even before COVID-19, the Trump Administration was pursuing economic policies that rewarded wealth over work and corporations over working families. Too many families were struggling to make ends meet and too many parents were worried about the economic future for their children. And, Black and Latino Americans, Native Americans, immigrants, and women have never been welcomed as full participants in the economy. Biden believes this is no time to just build back to the way things were before, with the old economy’s structural weaknesses and inequalities still in place. This is the moment to imagine and build a new American economy for our families and the next generation. An economy where every American enjoys a fair return for their work and an equal chance to get ahead. An economy more vibrant and more powerful precisely because everybody will be cut in on the deal. In this time of crisis, Joe Biden has a plan to create millions of good-paying jobs and to give America’s working families the tools, choices, and freedom they need to build back better. |
Biden’s picks for Secretary Labor
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| Boston Mayor Marty Walsh listens to a question at a press conference in March 2020 in Boston, Mass. Photo by Scott Eisen/Getty Images |
Mayor Marty Walsh, nominee for Secretary of Labor
President-elect Joe Biden has nominated Boston Mayor Marty Walsh to serve as his Labor secretary, an announcement that was made official Thursday night.
The news was first confirmed by Rep. Stephen Lynch to WCVB earlier in the day.
Walsh, 53, who is a former top union leader, is a longtime friend and supporter of the incoming president.
Biden's transition team says if confirmed, Walsh would be the first union member to serve in the role in nearly half a century.
"Mayor Walsh has worked tirelessly to rebuild the middle class, create a more inclusive, resilient economy, and fight for workers in his hometown — including fighting for a $15 minimum wage and paid family leave," Biden said in the announcement.
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