In at least one respect, President Bush's second term already promises to be far different from his first: The presidential transition will be a lot easier.
Four years ago, Bush began the transition process amid the uncertainty of the Florida recount. That forced him to lay the groundwork to name 15 Cabinet members and hire as many as 600 people for the White House staff and an additional 6,000 political appointees for other key government posts before he even knew for sure that he would be president.
This time, there are fewer jobs to fill, far less fuss surrounding the process and no real doubt about who was elected president. In a second term, federal agencies do not have to be restocked wholesale with political appointees, and departments need not adopt radically new policy approaches as when a new party assumes power. Also, many top White House staffers -- the key drivers of policy in modern presidential administrations -- are already in place.
In 2000, the Bush transition operation took more than 90,000 square feet of federal office space on G Street downtown and received $5.3 million in government funds to help launch the new administration in a 37-day sprint to Inauguration Day. This time, most of the transition is being handled within the White House. Although there has been substantial turnover in Bush's second-term Cabinet -- 9 of 15 secretaries are being replaced -- the White House staff is largely intact. Most notably, Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. and political strategist Karl Rove are staying on in those roles. That provides important continuity as Bush pursues an ambitious and controversial policy agenda, which includes revamping Social Security, curbing lawsuits, reshaping immigration laws and overhauling the tax code.
White House spokeswoman Erin Healy said there is "obviously presidential personnel involved" in filling jobs this time. She would not say how many posts remain vacant in the administration -- calling the situation fluid -- but added that seven special assistants under White House personnel head Dina Powell have divided the slots and are working to fill them.
Leon E. Panetta, White House chief of staff during President Bill Clinton's 1996 transition, said recently that there is less of a sense of urgency in the transition to a president's second term.
"The fact is that even if [Cabinet] secretaries move on, there usually are deputy secretaries who are political appointees who generally have a good feel for the operations of the department and can continue that operation in the interim," Panetta said in a telephone interview. "And you've got a White House team in place that obviously understands the drill, and they in turn can ensure continuity as well so that you don't have any departments or agencies going out into either left field or right field in terms of their operation."
"It's really a completely different kettle of fish from the initial transition," added John P. Burke, a political science professor at the University of Vermont and author of the book "Becoming President: The Bush Transition, 2000-2003."
"Bush is coming in to his second term with a very ambitious and robust agenda. That's unusual," Burke said. ". . . In 1997, Clinton really wasn't pushing major policy initiatives. I can't think of a case where we've had a second-term presidency that has a domestic agenda that looks like a first-term presidency, which is what we have here. It would signal to me that the White House certainly understands the political stakes involved and . . . the need to strike while the iron is hot."
Analysts said that Bush's choices for new Cabinet secretaries show that the administration is interested in having a seamless connection between policies developed in the White House and how they are carried out at the department level. Bush has named loyal aides to head key departments, including national security adviser Condoleezza Rice as his next secretary of state, White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales as attorney general, and domestic policy adviser Margaret Spellings as secretary of education.
"The agenda is being fashioned at the White House, and the choice of appointees has been clearly designed to execute the president's agenda rather than develop it," said Paul C. Light, a government professor at New York University's Wagner Graduate School of Public Service. "The White House knows pretty much where it wants to go and it has a pretty clear road map and they are not going to be wanting Cabinet secretaries to develop new policies. It's a very centralized operation."
For the most part, the Bush administration has handled the turnover with discipline and efficiency. The only major misstep has been Bush's decision to name former New York police commissioner Bernard B. Kerik to lead the Department of Homeland Security. Kerik abruptly withdrew his name Dec. 10 after saying that he had failed to pay taxes for a nanny who may have been in the country illegally. Subsequently, damaging details emerged about Kerik's business and personal life, raising questions about the White House vetting process. The White House still has not named a nominee to head Homeland Security, nor has Bush appointed anyone to the newly created post overseeing analysis of information developed by the nation's intelligence agencies.
In agencies where new leaders have been nominated, key staffers are preparing briefing books for incoming secretaries, while the White House has detailed people to help Cabinet nominees through the Senate confirmation process.
At the Department of Veterans Affairs, where former Republican National Committee chairman Jim Nicholson is slated to replace outgoing Secretary Anthony J. Principi, "the nominee will receive comprehensive briefings on the department's mission and day-to-day operations to include existing policies and initiatives," said Karen Fedele, a VA spokeswoman. She declined to elaborate.
At the Agriculture Department, staffers are preparing Nebraska Gov. Mike Johanns, nominated to succeed Secretary Ann M. Veneman, for any possible subject that he might be asked about at his confirmation hearings, said Alisa Harrison, a department spokeswoman. "We prepare whatever the confirmation folks who are managing his confirmation process ask us to, which includes just a tremendous amount of information," Harrison said. "But it's all being funneled through the White House."
