Joe Biden confirms Janet Yellen’s nomination for Treasury Secretary

The cabinet of US President-elect Joe Biden has promised a number of “first times”: Biden’s transition team has now confirmed that former Federal Reserve chief Janet Yellen is to become finance minister. Like all other cabinet members, she must also be confirmed by the Senate with at least 51 votes out of 100. Then the 74-year-old would become the first woman in US history to take over the leadership of the Treasury.

Biden also introduced other members of his future economic team on Monday. Neera Tanden, for example, is supposed to head the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), which is based at the White House, as the first US citizen with Indian roots.

Informed circles confirmed last week that Yellen should become finance minister. Yellen was the first woman to head the US Federal Reserve between 2014 and 2018. She advocated a loose monetary policy there in order to promote economic growth and employment.

US President Donald Trump then refused her a second term. She was replaced in 2018 by her then deputy Jerome Powell. As the successor to the current Finance Minister Steve Mnuchin, Yellen would have to fight the economic crisis resulting from the corona pandemic.

First woman becomes secret service director

Other personal details had already become known beforehand. For example, the former deputy chief of the CIA secret service, Avril Haines, is said to be the first woman in US history to become secret service director. It would thus coordinate the work of all US intelligence services in the future.

Alejandro Mayorkas is the first Latino to head the Ministry of Homeland Security, which is responsible for immigration, among other things.

In addition, Biden wants to appoint the experienced diplomat Antony Blinken as Secretary of State and former Secretary of State John Kerry as his climate officer.

Biden’s transition team has also confirmed that 43-year-old Jake Sullivan will become national security advisor. Sullivan was Biden’s security advisor when he was Vice President.

The career diplomat Linda Thomas-Greenfield will be the US Ambassador to the United Nations.

Republicans could block appointments to ministerial offices

With the nomination of the Biden team, however, the ministers have not yet been set – the Republicans could put a spanner in the works of the US President-elect. The news site “Axios” reports that the Republicans are already planning to block some of the ministers in Biden’s future cabinet if they retain a majority in the Senate. Above all, they want to prevent the US President-elect from appointing ministers on the left.