• Cover Story
• Table of
  Contents
• Contents By
  Topic
• Columns
  • Brownstein
  • Cook
  • Crook
  • Rauch
  • Stokes
  • Schneider
  • Taylor Jr.
• Regular
  Features
  • Hotline Extra
  • Inside Washington
  • Insiders Poll
  • K Street Corridor
  • People
  • The Week on the Hill

Decision Makers 2009

Meet Obama's Top Officials

As you've probably noticed, this issue of National Journal is a bit bigger than normal. That's because we've devoted virtually the entire issue to profiles of 366 of the top officials in the Obama administration. Some of the names, such as those of Rahm Emanuel, David Axelrod, and Hillary Rodham Clinton, will be familiar. Others less so -- the Janet Lutes, Rajiv Shahs, and Laurel Blatchfords who fill the ranks of deputy secretary, assistant secretary, and chief of staff in various Cabinet departments and agencies. We're continuing a tradition we started in 1981 in profiling key administration officials about five months into a president's term.

Selecting the 366 was part science and part art. For the Cabinet departments and federal agencies, we began with a list of positions that require Senate confirmation. We subtracted ambassadors, who don't play much of a Washington role, and some officials whose duties are primarily financial or administrative. Then we added certain positions (such as a Cabinet department chief of staff) that are often crucial to a department's success. The selection of White House aides was more subjective: We relied on the expertise of our reporters and editors to highlight important people working in the West and East Wings. No doubt we overlooked a person or two along the way; our apologies if you fall into that category. On balance, however, this issue should give readers a pretty good sense of the most important players in the Obama administration. If you see the word "designate" next to a title, the subject of the profile had not been confirmed by press time. Among those profiled are a few dozen holdover officials from the Bush administration -- people who are serving until Obama nominates a successor, or who are on boards or commissions because their terms haven't expired.

As in 2001 and 2005, we collected demographic data on the 366 administration officials. Those results can be found in our introductory story on p. 18 and the graphics that accompany the article. We also asked our pool of Political Insiders to grade President Obama's team. Their responses can be found on the next few pages. You can also access the 366 profiles online at NationalJournal.com/decisionmakers.

Many thanks to the dozens of staff members who put together this issue. The profiles were written by National Journal reporters as well as by staff members of several other Atlantic Media publications, including The Atlantic, CongressDaily, Government Executive, Hotline, and NationalJournal.com. A special thanks to our photographers, who shot some 150 pictures for this issue; Managing Editor Steve Gettinger, who coordinated the issue; our editors and copy editors, who read every word of the issue; and our production personnel, who managed to make everything come together. You can order additional copies of Decision Makers by calling 1-800-207-8001.

Suzanne P. Clark
President

Charles Green
Editor