BlackRock Executive Brian Deese Could Get Major White House Position
Back in 2016, BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, built what amounted to a shadow government, designed to help their CEO Larry Fink become Treasury secretary in a Hillary Clinton administration. Numerous former Obama administration officials decamped to BlackRock, giving Fink the connections and expertise he needed to work his way into the Clinton Cabinet.
That Cabinet never materialized, of course, and this time around, Janet Yellen has already been given the Treasury secretary nod, as our Robert Kuttner first reported. But BlackRock’s influence in a Biden administration has not gone away. The Prospect has learned that Brian Deese, a former Obama administration official who became managing director and global head of sustainable investing at BlackRock, is the leading candidate to run the National Economic Council (NEC), a critical coordinating position at the White House.
Deese, who appears on a hit list of corporate-friendly potential candidates disfavored by progressive activists, held several jobs in the Obama White House, including four years at the NEC as special assistant to the president for economic policy and deputy director. He also did a turn as deputy and acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, and a senior adviser to Obama on climate policy.
The last one was an interesting landing spot, because Deese had no policy experience with climate. During his tenure, Deese endorsed the significant rise in fossil fuel production under Obama, and defended continuing oil drilling in Alaska and fracking on public land, something even Biden has ruled out.
Read more: https://prospect.org/cabinet-watch/blackrock-executive-brian-deese-could-get-major-white-house-position/
(American Prospect)
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