Biden to appoint Nigerian-born Adeyemo deputy treasury secretary

After facing criticism for the lack of diversity in his first round of hires, President-elect Joe Biden plans to announce three people of color for leading positions on his economic team.

According to two people close to Biden’s presidential transition, he is expected to name Cecilia Rouse, an African American economist at Princeton University, to lead the Council of Economic Advisers.

Adewale “Wally” Adeyemo, a Nigerian-born attorney and former senior international economic adviser during the Obama administration, will serve as deputy Treasury secretary under former Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen, who Biden plans to appoint to lead the Treasury Department.

And as director of the Office of Management and Budget, Biden plans to nominate Neera Tanden, president of the liberal thinktank Center for American Progress and a former senior policy adviser to both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaigns. Tanden is Indian American.

Biden also plans to name longtime economic aides Heather Boushey and Jared Bernstein to serve on the CEA, according to people familiar with the plans. Both Boushey and Bernstein are white.

The personnel moves were first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

Biden has also settled on a former senior Obama administration official, Brian Deese, as his top economic adviser in the White House, though the announcement may not come until later this week, after the transition unveils the other, more diverse, picks for his economic team.

People close to Biden’s transition confirmed that Deese, the global head of sustainable investing at investment giant BlackRock, is Biden’s pick for director of the National Economic Council in the White House. His selection is likely to rankle some progressives, who have taken issue with his current job in the financial sector.

Biden has been under rising pressure to select more people of color for senior jobs in his administration. One of his most prominent allies, Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), told reporters last week he was unhappy with the number of Black people in Biden’s administration. Clyburn, the highest ranking Black lawmaker in Congress, was widely credited with helping Biden win the South Carolina presidential primary, which revived his struggling campaign. Punch