Gary Gensler, Biden's pick to head SEC, has reputation as tough regulator
In nominating Gary Gensler to serve as chairman for the Securities and Exchange Commission, President-elect Joe Biden is likely to please progressives, who have been agitating for more bank oversight after four years of deregulatory policy under President Donald Trump’s SEC pick, Jay Clayton, who stepped down in December.
“Gensler is a terrific choice to head the agency," said Barbara Roper, director of investor protection at the Consumer Federation of America. "He’s as knowledgeable about the markets as anyone on Wall Street, so he can’t be intimidated. He’s a seasoned regulator who knows how to get things done.”
Gensler spent 18 years at Goldman Sachs before joining the Treasury Department during the Clinton administration. Following a stint at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission — where he earned a reputation as a tough regulator — he served as an economic adviser for Hillary Clinton’s 2012 and 2016 presidential bids, and since the 2020 election, he has led the Biden transition team’s financial regulatory group.
At the CFTC, “Gary proved he was relentless and effective at adopting and implementing difficult rules. He worked very quickly, very thoughtfully, very aggressively,” said Tyler Gellasch, executive director of investor advocacy group Healthy Markets.
Avril Haines, Biden's pick for top spy, to tell Senate she'll keep politics out of intelligence analysis
Joe Biden's nominee to lead America's vast spying bureaucracy is expected to tell senators weighing her confirmation that she will protect whistleblowers, speak truth to power and keep politics out of intelligence analysis, according to excerpts of her prepared statement obtained by NBC News.
The Senate Intelligence Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing Tuesday to consider the nomination of Avril Haines, who was a national security official during the Obama administration, to become director of national intelligence. She would oversee 18 intelligence agencies, including the CIA and the National Security Agency.
Haines, who was deputy CIA director and deputy national security adviser in the Obama administration, will also tell lawmakers that she intends to prioritize countering China, bolstering cyber defenses and anticipating the next pandemic, according to the prepared remarks.
Biden, Harris to speak from Lincoln Memorial about lives lost to Covid-19
On the eve of their inauguration, President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris will speak Tuesday at the Lincoln Memorial's reflecting pool in Washington, D.C., to honor the lives lost from Covid-19.
Their remarks will come a day before they'll be sworn into office at 12 p.m. ET on the west front of the U.S. Capitol.
The Biden administration’s biggest challenge will be addressing the coronavirus pandemic during its worst period and trying to distribute vaccines nationwide. The president-elect laid out a comprehensive plan last week to get shots in arms to stem the spread of Covid.
Biden's NSC to focus on 'domestic violent extremism'
The Biden administration plans to make domestic terrorism a key focus of the National Security Council, according to transition officials.
Officials have been looking at ways to shift government resources that have been used for counterterrorism to combating domestic terrorism, officials said. The incoming administration plans to make announcements on the effort in the coming days.
After some internal debate over what to call the issue officially, the Biden administration is expected to refer to it as “domestic violent extremism” rather than domestic terrorism. The NSC’s emphasis on domestic violent extremism would involve traditional principals committee meetings and coordination with relevant agencies, including the Homeland Security and Justice departments, officials said.
Biden pointedly labeled the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol as domestic terrorism in speech announcing his Justice Department nominees.
“They weren't protestors,” Biden said. “They were a riotous mob. Insurrectionists. Domestic terrorists. It's that basic. It's that simple.”
For Biden's team, a transition many months in the making
WILMINGTON, Del. — It was November when the word "ascertainment" entered the political lexicon as the bureaucratic barrier for Joe Biden's ability to formally begin his transition. But the word had been a front-of-center concern for months for his under-the-radar planning team, so much so that in late June its executive director, Yohannes Abraham, emailed an outside expert requesting a full briefing about the potential ramifications — and began developing a game plan for how the Biden team could move ahead without it.
The ascertainment question, which wasn't until three weeks after Election Day, was just one of several potential barriers Biden's team had to consider. Members referred to them as the "extraordinary challenges" — largely, but not exclusively, Trump-related headaches that would have to be addressed if the already-daunting task of standing up an administration in just 11 weeks would have any chance of success.
But against those odds, when Biden takes the oath in two days, he will have an administration with more key positions filled than some of his recent predecessors had and a policy process ready to tackle the multiple challenges he will face.
Trump to lift some Covid travel restrictions, a move Biden quickly rejects
President Donald Trump said Monday that he is ending Covid-19 travel restrictions for air travelers from Europe and Brazil, a move the incoming administration quickly rejected.
In a proclamation, Trump said the restrictions would be lifted Jan. 26, the same day a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention order requiring negative tests for air travelers coming to the U.S. takes effect.
But by then, Joe Biden will be president, and his press secretary tweeted that the restrictions would remain in place.
U.S. surpasses 400,000 Covid deaths nearly one year after nation's first confirmed case
More than 400,000 people have died of the coronavirus in the U.S., according to an NBC News tally early Tuesday, a milestone that seemed unimaginable at the start of the pandemic a year ago.
More than 2 million people have been recorded killed by the virus worldwide, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. The U.S. death toll is the world's worst, even though it makes up less than 5 percent of the world's population.
As of early Tuesday, there have been 400,103 U.S. deaths, according to NBC News' count. The U.S. confirmed its first case of the virus in Seattle on Jan. 21, 2020.
Janet Yellen to warn of recession unless Congress takes 'big' action
Janet Yellen, Biden's nominee for treasury secretary, will warn at her confirmation hearing Tuesday that the U.S. is heading toward a major recession unless lawmakers "act big," according to her prepared remarks.
“Neither the president-elect, nor I, propose this relief package without an appreciation for the country’s debt burden. But right now, with interest rates at historic lows, the smartest thing we can do is act big. In the long run, I believe the benefits will far outweigh the costs, especially if we care about helping people who have been struggling for a very long time,” Yellen will say.
Yellen’s testimony, which she will deliver remotely to the Senate Finance Committee starting at 10 a.m. ET, comes days after Biden released his economic and Covid-19 relief plan.
“People worry about a K-shaped recovery but well before COVID-19 infected a single American, we were living in a K-shaped economy, one where wealth built on wealth while working families fell further and further behind. This is especially true for people of color," she will say.