US: Biden announces economic team; confirms Indian-American Neera Tanden as OMB director

US President-elect Joe Biden on Monday announced key members of his "crisis tested" economic team including Janet Yellen as Secretary of the Treasury, Neera Tanden as Director of the Office of Management and Budget, and Wally Adeyemo as Deputy Secretary of the Treasury.

50-year-old Tanden would be the first woman of colour to head the influential office at the White House.

Cecilia Rouse will be the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers; and Jared Bernstein and Heather Boushey, members of the Council of Economic Advisers.

Rouse, an African-American, would be the first woman of colour to chair the council, which will play a key role in advising the president on the economy.

The announcement came a day after Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris announced their all-female communications team.

Who is Neera Tanden?

A Yale law graduate, Tanden had earlier worked for former President Bill Clinton's campaign and went on to work at the White House as an associate director for domestic policy and as an adviser to Hillary Clinton.

When Hillary Clinton ran successfully for senator, Tanden was her deputy campaign manager and became her legislative director after her election.

She advised Clinton's presidential campaign and was tipped for a senior White House job were she to win.

Tanden worked as a senior adviser to the Health and Human Services Department in former President Barack Obama's administration, helping craft his affordable healthcare law and programme.

Below is the extract on Neera Tanden, the first-ever Indian-American tipped to lead the Office of Management and Budget:

"Neera Tanden currently serves as President & CEO of the Center for American Progress, an organization dedicated to advancing policies that increase opportunity for every American. A veteran of multiple presidential administrations, Tanden has been a leading architect and advocate of policies designed to support working families, foster broad-based economic growth, and curb inequality throughout her career. Her experience as a child relying on food stamps and Section 8 housing -- a social safety net that offered her single mother the foundation she needed to land a good job and punch her family`s ticket to the middle class -- instilled in her the true necessity of an economy that serves the dignity and humanity of all people. If confirmed, Tanden would be the first woman of color and the first South Asian American to lead the OMB.

"Prior to her tenure as President & CEO, Tanden held the post of Chief Operating Officer at the Center for American Progress. She currently serves on the New Jersey Restart and Recovery Commission, and previously served as senior adviser for health reform at the US Department of Health and Human Services developing policies and provisions of the Affordable Care Act, as director of domestic policy for the first Obama-Biden presidential campaign, and in a variety of other roles in government and on the campaign trail. A native of Bedford, Massachusetts, Tanden received her bachelor of science degree from UCLA and her JD from Yale Law School."

(With agency inputs)