White House Author

Danielle Gray is the former Assistant to the President and Cabinet Secretary. She served as President Obama’s primary liaison to the Cabinet departments and agencies, helping to coordinate policy and communications strategy across the Administration. Prior to this, she served as Deputy Director of the National Economic Council and Deputy Assistant to the President for Economic Policy, where she focused on labor, education, and training issues.

Ms. Gray previously served as Senior Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division, where she focused on constitutional challenges to federal statutes, policies, and agency actions. She also served as Special Assistant to the President and Associate Counsel to the President. In that role, she provided legal advice on domestic and economic policy issues ranging from health care to labor to civil rights. She also worked on judicial nominations, including two Supreme Court confirmations.

Before joining the Administration, Ms. Gray served as Deputy National Policy Director for Obama for America. Prior to this, she was an associate with the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom in New York. Earlier in her career, she served as a Law Clerk to Justice Stephen Breyer on the Supreme Court of the United States and to Judge Merrick Garland on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. She also worked on the policy and research staff of the President’s 2004 United States Senate campaign.

Ms. Gray received her bachelor’s degree in Economics and Public Policy from Duke University and her J.D. from Harvard Law School, where she served as an editor of the Harvard Law Review.