President Obama Announces More Key Administration Posts

WASHINGTON, DC – Today, President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate the following individuals to key Administration posts:

• Tony G. Collins – Member, Advisory Board of the Saint Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation
• Robert M. Gordon – Assistant Secretary for Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development, Department of Education
• Cheryl A. LaFleur – Commissioner, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission  
• David Arthur Mader – Controller of the Office of Federal Financial Management, Office of Management and Budget
• John Maeda – Member, National Council on the Arts
• Jeffrey A. Murawsky – Under Secretary for Health, Department of Veterans Affairs
• Marcia Denise Occomy – United States Director, African Development Bank
• Gentry O. Smith – Director of the Office of Foreign Missions, with the rank of Ambassador during his tenure of service, Department of State
• Debra S. Wada – Assistant Secretary of the Army for Manpower and Reserve Affairs, Department of Defense
• George Albert Krol – Ambassador to the Republic of Kazakhstan, Department of State
• Mark William Lippert – Ambassador to the Republic of Korea, Department of State
• James D. Nealon – Ambassador to the Republic of Honduras, Department of State
• Dana Shell Smith – Ambassador to the State of Qatar, Department of State

President Obama also announced his intent to appoint the following individual to a key Administration post:

• Jason W. Young – Member, President’s Advisory Council on Financial Capability for Young Americans

President Obama said, “I am pleased to announce that these experienced and committed individuals have agreed to join this Administration, and I look forward to working with them in the months and years ahead.”

President Obama announced his intent to nominate the following individuals to key Administration posts:

Dr. Tony G. Collins, Nominee for Member, Advisory Board of the Saint Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation
Dr. Tony G. Collins is currently the President of Clarkson University, a position he has held since 2003.  Prior to this position, Dr. Collins served in a variety of roles at Clarkson University from 1982 to 2003.  Most recently, he served as Provost from 2001 to 200 and Vice President for Academic Affairs from 1997 to 2001.  He also served as Dean of Engineering from 1996 to 1998, and Professor and Chair of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering from 1992 to 1996.  Dr. Collins served as a Visiting Scientist with Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation’s Division of Water Resources in Canberra, Australia in 1999.  He was an Environmental Coordinator with the Utah Development Company from 1975 to 1976.  From 1973 to 1975, Dr. Collins served as Manager of Australian Consolidated Industries and Assistant Project Engineer in 1971.  Since 2011, he has served as Co-Chair of the North Country Regional Economic Development Council.  Dr. Collins received a B.E. from Monash University and an M.S. and Ph.D. from Lehigh University. 

Robert M. Gordon, Nominee for Assistant Secretary for Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development, Department of Education
Robert M. Gordon is currently a Guest Scholar at the Brookings Institution.  From 2009 to 2013, Mr. Gordon served in various roles at the Office of Management and Budget, including Acting Deputy Director, Executive Associate Director, and Associate Director for Human Resources.  From 2005 to 2006 and 2007 to 2008, Mr. Gordon was a Senior Fellow and Senior Vice President for Economic Policy at the Center for American Progress.  From 2006 to 2007, he was Chief Executive for Resource Allocation at the New York City Department of Education.  Mr. Gordon previously worked on Capitol Hill and at the Juvenile Rights Division of the Legal Aid Society in New York.  From 2000 to 2001, Mr. Gordon was a Law Clerk for United States Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg.  He received a B.A. from Harvard University and a J.D. from Yale Law School.

Cheryl A. LaFleur, Nominee for Commissioner, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
Cheryl A. LaFleur has been a Commissioner of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission since 2010 and was designated Acting Chairman in 2013.  In 2008, prior to joining the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Ms. LaFleur was President and CEO of The Steppingstone Foundation.  From 2006 to 2007, Ms. LaFleur served as Executive Vice President and acting CEO of National Grid USA.  She was President and CEO of New England Distribution at National Grid USA from 2001 to 2005.  From 1986 to 2000, Ms. LaFleur worked for New England Electric System in a variety of roles, including Senior Vice President and General Counsel.  From 1978 through 1986, she was an attorney at Ropes & Gray LLP in Boston.  Ms. LaFleur received an A.B. from Princeton University and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.

David Arthur Mader, Nominee for Controller of the Office of Federal Financial Management, Office of Management and Budget
David Arthur Mader is currently a Senior Vice President for Strategy and Organization at Booz Allen Hamilton, a position he has held since 2007.  From 2004 and 2007, he was a Principal at Booz Allen Hamilton focusing on strategy and organization.  From 2003 to 2004, Mr. Mader was the Managing Director of the Public Sector practice of Sirota Survey Intelligence.  Before joining Sirota Survey Intelligence, Mr. Mader held various positions at the Internal Revenue Service from 1971 to 2003, including Acting Deputy Commissioner, Acting Deputy Commissioner for Modernization and CIO, Assistant Deputy Commissioner, and Chief for Management and Finance.  Mr. Mader received a B.S. from Mount St. Mary’s University.

Dr. John Maeda, Nominee for Member, National Council on the Arts
Dr. John Maeda is a Design Partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, a venture firm he joined in 2014.  Previously, he was the 16^th President of the Rhode Island School of Design from 2008 to 2013.  Dr. Maeda was Professor and Associate Director of Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media Laboratory from 1996 to 2008, and a researcher and software engineer at the International Media Research Foundation from 1990 to 1996.  He serves on the Board of Directors of Sonos, Inc. and Wieden+Kennedy, and he chairs the eBay Design Advisory Council.  Dr. Maeda received a B.S. and an M.S. from MIT, an M.B.A. from Arizona State University, and a Ph.D. in Design Science from the University of Tsukuba Institute of Arts and Design in Japan.

Dr. Jeffrey A. Murawsky, Nominee for Under Secretary for Health, Department of Veterans Affairs
Dr. Jeffrey A. Murawsky is the Network Director of the Veterans Integrated Service Network (VISN 12), a position he has held since 2009.  Dr. Murawsky is also currently an Associate Professor of Medicine at Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine.  Prior to becoming the Network Director of VISN 12, Dr. Murawsky was the Chief Medical Officer for the Network from 2006 to 2009.  He served as the Associate Manager for Medicine and Neurology Services at the Edward Hines, Jr. VA Hospital and as the Associate Program Director for Internal Medicine at the combined program with Loyola University Medical Center.  Before joining the Hines VA Hospital in 2001, he was the director of community based teaching for the Loyola University Health System and the medical director of the Loyola/Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago Center.  Dr. Murawsky received a B.A. from Brandeis University and an M.D. from Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine.

Marcia Denise Occomy, Nominee for United States Director, African Development Bank
Marcia Denise Occomy is currently a Specialist Leader in the Emerging Markets Division of Deloitte Consulting LLP.  During her tenure at Deloitte, Ms. Occomy worked with the United States Agency for International Development on various assignments.  Most recently, she served as an Advisor on the Economic Governance reform project providing technical assistance to the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of South Sudan.  She also served as Team Leader of the Capacity Development Program in Afghanistan from 2009 to 2012, Ministry of Finance Advisor in Egypt in 2006, and Deputy Chief of Party and Advisor in Ukraine from 2005 to 2006.  Ms. Occomy was also Senior Advisor for assignments in Iraq from 2003 to 2005, Kosovo from 2001 to 2003, and Kazakhstan from 1999 to 2001.  From 1992 to 1999, Ms. Occomy served as an Analyst at the Office of Management and Budget.  She received a B.A. from Vassar College and an M.A. from The University of Chicago.

Gentry O. Smith, Nominee for Director of the Office of Foreign Missions, with the rank of Ambassador during his tenure of service, Department of State
Gentry O. Smith, a career member of the Foreign Service, class of Minister-Counselor, is Deputy Assistant Secretary and Assistant Director for Countermeasures at the Department of State, a position he has held since 2009.  Previously, Mr. Smith served as Director of the Office of Physical Security Programs.  He has served as the Regional Security Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, Japan and the U.S. Embassy in Rangoon, Burma.  He served as a Security Officer and Deputy Regional Security Officer during two separate tours at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, Egypt.  Mr. Smith entered service with the Department of State in 1987 and joined the ranks of the Senior Foreign Service in 2006.  Before joining the State Department, he served as a Police Officer with the Raleigh Police Department.  Mr. Smith received a B.A. from North Carolina State University.

Debra S. Wada, Nominee for Assistant Secretary of the Army for Manpower and Reserve Affairs, Department of Defense
Debra S. Wada is a professional staff member for the Subcommittee on Military Personnel for the House Armed Services Committee, a position she has held since 1999.  Ms. Wada served as the lead staff member for the Subcommittee from 2007 to 2010, and briefly served as Deputy Staff Director for the committee in 2011.  In 1999, Ms. Wada served as a Legislative Affairs Specialist for the National Park Service.  Ms. Wada served as a Legislative Assistant for U.S. Senator Daniel K. Akaka, acting as the Senator’s principal aide on national defense, veterans’ affairs, maritime issues, education, Social Security and welfare from 1987 to 1999.  Ms. Wada received a B.A. from Drake University.

Ambassador George Albert Krol, Nominee for Ambassador to the Republic of Kazakhstan, Department of State
Ambassador George Albert Krol, a career member of the Foreign Service, Class of Minister-Counselor, is currently the U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Uzbekistan, a position he has held since 2011.  Previously, he served in the Department of State as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs from 2008 to 2010.  Ambassador Krol was Faculty Advisor at the National War College from 2006 to 2007.  From 2003 to 2006, he was the U.S. Ambassador to Belarus.  He also served as Minister-Counselor for Political Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, Russia from 1999 to 2002, Director of the Office of Russian Affairs in the Bureau of European and Canadian Affairs from 1997 to 1999, and Special Assistant to the Ambassador-at-Large for the New Independent States from 1995 to 1997.  Ambassador Krol was the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Minsk, Belarus from 1993 to 1995, Political and Economic Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Kiev, Ukraine from 1992 to 1993, and Political and Economic Officer at the U.S. Consulate General in Leningrad/St. Petersburg, Russia from 1990 to 1992.  He has also served as a Desk Officer in the Office of East European and Yugoslav Affairs, and was a Watch Officer in the Operations Center at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi, India and the U.S. Embassy in Warsaw, Poland.  Ambassador Krol received an A.B. at Harvard University and a B.A. and M.A. from Oxford University.

Mark William Lippert, Nominee for Ambassador to the Republic of Korea, Department of State
Mark William Lippert, a U.S. Navy veteran with service in Iraq and Afghanistan, is currently The Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense and the Deputy Secretary of Defense, a position he has held since 2013.  Previously, he was Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs from 2011 to 2012, Intelligence Officer at the Naval Special Warfare Development Group in Virginia Beach, Virginia from 2009 to 2011, and Deputy Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff for the National Security Council in 2009.  He served as Deputy Director for Foreign Policy of the Obama-Biden Transition Project in Chicago, Illinois and Washington, D.C. from 2008 to 2009, and Senior Foreign Policy Advisor for Obama for America in Chicago, Illinois from August 2008 to November 2008.  Previously, Mr. Lippert was the Foreign Policy Advisor in the Office of U.S. Senator Barack Obama from 2005 to 2008.  From 2007 to 2008, he took a leave of absence from that position to deploy with Seal Team One in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.  He was a Professional Staff Member on the Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on State-Foreign Operations in the U.S. Senate from 2000 to 2005.  In addition, he was a Policy Advisor to the Democratic Policy Committee in the U.S. Senate and a Legislative Correspondent in the Office of U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein.  He served on active duty in the U.S. Navy from 2007 to 2008 and 2009 to 2011, and has been an Intelligence Officer in the U.S. Naval Reserve since 2005.  He received a B.A. and M.A. from Stanford University.

James D. Nealon, Nominee for Ambassador to the Republic of Honduras, Department of State
James D. Nealon, a career member of the Foreign Service, Class of Minister-Counselor, is the Civilian Deputy to the Commander and Foreign Policy Advisor at U.S. Southern Command in Doral, Florida, a position he has held since 2013.  He was Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassies in Ottawa, Canada from 2010 to 2013, Lima, Peru from 2007 to 2010, and Montevideo, Uruguay from 2005 to 2007.  Previously, he served as Charge d'Affaires in Montevideo.  He served as Counselor for Public Affairs at U.S. Embassies in Madrid, Spain and Budapest, Hungary.  He was the Press Attaché at the U.S. Embassies in Manila, Philippines and Budapest, the Cultural Attaché in Montevideo, and Assistant Press Attaché in Santiago, Chile.  Mr. Nealon also served in Washington in the Bureau of Human Resources of the United States Information Agency.  Earlier in his career, he was a high school teacher and athletics coach.  Mr. Nealon received a B.A. from Brown University.

Dana Shell Smith, Nominee for Ambassador to the State of Qatar, Department of State

Dana Shell Smith, a career member of the Foreign Service, Class of Minister-Counselor, is currently Senior Advisor to the Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, a position she has held since early 2014.  Previously, Ms. Smith served as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Public Affairs at the Department of State from 2011 to 2014.  She was the Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Media in the Bureau of Public Affairs from 2010 to 2011, and Regional Arabic Spokesperson for the Regional Media Hub in Dubai from 2009 to 2010.  She also served as Senior Advisor in the Office of Career Development and Assignments in the Bureau of Human Resources from 2006 to 2008.  She was a Public Affairs Officer at the American Institute of Taiwan from 2003 to 2006 and a Press Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Amman, Jordan from 1999 to 2002.  From 1996 to 1999, she was a Public Diplomacy Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv, Israel and was Assistant Cultural Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, Egypt from 1993 to 1996.  Ms. Smith received a B.A. from the University of California, San Diego.

President Obama announced his intent to appoint the following individual to a key Administration post:

Jason W. Young, Appointee for Member, President’s Advisory Council on Financial Capability for Young Americans
Jason W. Young is co-founder and CEO of Mindblown Labs, a social enterprise that uses gaming to teach young people about personal finance and other 21st century skills.  He is also the Founder and President of Hidden Genius Project, a year-round mentoring and youth workforce development program.  In 2010, he founded Zindagi, LLC, an education technology company that produced web-based financial literacy software for families with students aged 9 to 13.  Previously, Mr. Young was a Product Manager at Nvest, Inc. from 2007 to 2009.  He held various positions at Merrill Lynch Global Private Client, including Corporate Strategy and Business Development Analyst from 2006 to 2007 and Wrap Finance Senior Specialist from 2004 to 2006.  Mr. Young founded New World Tutorial Services where he was a Private Tutor from 1997 to 2002.  He also founded J.W. Young and Associates Travel Agency where he worked as a Travel Agent from 1995 to 1997.  Mr. Young received an A.B. from Harvard University.

Readout of the Vice President’s Meeting with Secretary General Shigeru Ishiba of Japan

Today, Vice President Biden met with Liberal Democratic Party of Japan Secretary General Shigeru Ishiba at the White House.  The two leaders underscored the importance of the U.S.-Japan Alliance to regional and global security.  They discussed Russia’s violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and steps that both countries have recently taken to impose costs on Russia.  The Vice President emphasized the need to keep building strong support for the alliance, to include ensuring the successful conclusion of Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations that provide meaningful economic benefits to the people of both countries.  The Vice President and Secretary General Ishiba also agreed to cooperate on the realignment of U.S. forces in Japan in order to reduce the impact of U.S. bases in Okinawa, while enhancing the deterrent value of the Alliance.

FACT SHEET: Big Data and Privacy Working Group Review

Driven by the declining cost of data collection, storage, and processing; fueled by new online and real-world sources of data, including sensors, cameras, and geospatial technologies; and analyzed using a suite of creative and powerful new methods, big data is fundamentally reshaping how Americans and people around the world live, work, and communicate. It is enabling important discoveries and innovations in public safety, health care, medicine, education, energy use, agriculture, and a host of other areas. But big data technologies also raise challenging questions about how best to protect privacy and other values in a world where data collection will be increasingly ubiquitous, multidimensional, and permanent.

In January, President Obama asked his Counselor John Podesta to lead a 90-day review of big data and privacy. The review was conceived as fundamentally a scoping exercise, designed to define for the President what is new about the technologies that define the big data landscape; uncover where and how big data affects public policy and the laws and norms governing privacy; to ask how and whether big data creates new challenges for the principles animating the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights embraced by the Administration in 2012; and to lay out an agenda for how government can maximize the benefits and minimize the risks of big data.

The working group—which included Commerce Secretary Pritzker, Energy Secretary Moniz, the President's Science Advisor John Holdren, the President's Economic Advisor Jeff Zients, and other Senior Administration Officials—sought public input and worked over 90 days with academic researchers and privacy advocates, regulators and the technology industry, advertisers and civil rights groups, the international community and the American public. This review was supported by a parallel effort by the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) to research the technological trends underpinning big data.

Today, Podesta and the big data working group presented their findings and recommendations to the President. The review did not set out to answer every question about big data, nor was it intended to develop a comprehensive policy approach to big data. However, by evaluating the opportunities and challenges presented by big data, the working group was able to draw important conclusions and make concrete recommendations to the President for Administration attention and policy development.

SEIZING OPPORTUNITIES

We live in a world of near-ubiquitous data collection where that data is being crunched at a speed increasingly approaching real-time. This revolution presents incredible opportunities:

• Big data is saving lives. Infections are dangerous—even deadly—for many babies born prematurely. By collecting and analyzing millions of data points from a neonatal intensive care unit, one study was able to identify factors, like slight changes in body temperature and heart rate, that serve as early warning signs an infection may be taking root—subtle changes that even the most experienced doctors may not have have noticed on their own.
• Big data is making the economy work better. Jet engines and delivery trucks now come outfitted with sensors that continuously monitor hundreds of data points and send automatic alerts when maintenance is needed. Utility companies are starting to use big data to predict periods of peak electric demand, adjusting the grid to be more efficient and potentially averting brown-outs.
• Big data is saving taxpayer dollars. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services have begun using predictive analytics—a big data technique—to flag likely instances of reimbursement fraud before claims are paid. The Fraud Prevention System helps identify the highest-risk health care providers for waste, fraud, and abuse in real time and has already stopped, prevented, or identified $115 million in fraudulent payments.

Big data also presents powerful opportunities in areas as diverse as medical research, agriculture, energy efficiency, global development, education, environmental monitoring, and modeling climate change impacts, among others.

PRESERVING OUR VALUES

The opportunities presented by big data are considerable, but big data raises serious concerns about how we protect our privacy and other values. For example:

• Big data tools can alter the balance of power between government and citizen. Government agencies can reap enormous benefits from using big data to improve service delivery or detect payment fraud. But government uses of big data also have the potential to chill the exercise of free speech or free association. As more data is collected, analyzed, and stored on both public and private systems, we must be vigilant in ensuring that balance is maintained between government and citizens, and revise our laws accordingly.
• Big data tools can reveal intimate personal details. One powerful big data technique involves merging multiple data sets, drawn from disparate sources, to reveal complex patterns. But this practice, sometimes known as “data fusion,” can also lead to the so-called “mosaic effect,” whereby personally identifiable information can be discerned even from ostensibly anonymized data. As big data becomes even more widely used in the private sector to bring a wellspring of innovations and productivity, we must ensure that effective consumer privacy protections are in place to protect individuals.
• Big data tools could lead to discriminatory outcomes. As more decisions about our commercial and personal lives are determined by algorithms and automated processes, we must pay careful attention that big data does not systematically disadvantage certain groups, whether inadvertently or intentionally. We must prevent new modes of discrimination that some uses of big data may enable, particularly with regard to longstanding civil rights protections in housing, employment, and credit.

POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

No matter how quickly technology advances, it remains within our power to ensure that we both encourage innovation and protect our values through law, policy, and the practices we encourage in the public and private sector. To that end, the working group made six actionable policy recommendations in their report to the President:

• Advance the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights because consumers deserve clear, understandable, reasonable standards for how their personal information is used in the big data era.
• Pass National Data Breach Legislation that provides for a single national data breach standard, along the lines of the Administration's 2011 Cybersecurity legislative proposal.
• Extend Privacy Protections to non-U.S. Persons because privacy is a worldwide value that should be reflected in how the federal government handles personally identifiable information from non-U.S. citizens.
• Ensure Data Collected on Students in School is used for Educational Purposes to drive better learning outcomes while protecting students against their data being shared or used inappropriately.
• Expand Technical Expertise to Stop Discrimination because the federal government should build the technical expertise to be able to identify practices and outcomes facilitated by big data analytics that have a discriminatory impact on protected classes.
• Amend the Electronic Communications Privacy Act to ensure the standard of protection for online, digital content is consistent with that afforded in the physical world—including by removing archaic distinctions between email left unread or over a certain age.

Readout of National Security Advisor Susan E. Rice's Meeting with Egyptian Foreign Minister Fahmy

Today, National Security Advisor Susan E. Rice met with Egyptian Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy to discuss Egypt’s political transition and regional security issues.  Ambassador Rice reaffirmed U.S. support for Egypt and underscored our commitment to maintain cooperation on shared security interests such as countering extremism and maintaining regional stability.  She also reiterated our deep, growing concerns about recent developments in Egypt, including the mass trials and death sentences handed down this week, the continued detention of journalists and activists, and ongoing restrictions on freedoms of expression, assembly, and association.  The United States values its relationship with the Egyptian people and will continue to support a transition to democracy that respects their rights, and enables the stability and success of the Egyptian government.