Building 44

Federal agencies and the Obama transition | FULL COVERAGE »

President-elect Barack Obama, shown getting in his car after a visit to Manny's coffee shop and deli in Chicago, plans to announce his national security appointments on the Monday after Thanksgiving, sources say. (By Charles Dharapak -- Associated Press)

"He would bring a lot of the military dimension to the job," said Wesley K. Clark, a retired four-star general who was one of Jones's predecessors as NATO commander. "And his nonpartisanship at this juncture is really important. He provides a nonpartisan standard for the national interest -- that would be the presumption given his previous experience."

Said Jessica Tuchman Mathews, president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace: "I think that would be a very strong appointment. He's got very broad experience, both geographically and substantively, and he's been outstanding in everything he's done."

Mathews and other officials said they expected that Jones would also help impose order in the national security bureaucracy. Over the course of the Bush administration, national security advisers Condoleezza Rice and Steven J. Hadley have been criticized by some for not resolving interagency conflicts, although some of those disputes have receded in recent years.

Jones "is certain to be viewed as a very formidable figure," said David Rothkopf, who served in the Clinton administration and wrote a book about the NSC. "This is a general right out of central casting. He is extremely strong and forceful and thoughtful. . . . If you want a disciplined NSC process, this is your man."

Jones also has experience with many of the big issues that will confront the new administration. As NATO commander, he was intimately involved in assembling troops and other resources for the mission in Afghanistan. He also knows something about energy, a subject the Obama team expects to figure prominently in foreign policy discussions. Jones currently heads the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Institute for 21st Century Energy.

He is known for being low-key but blunt: Journalist Bob Woodward wrote that Jones told then-Joint Chiefs Chairman Peter Pace that he "should not be the parrot on the secretary's shoulder," referring to Donald H. Rumsfeld.

Sources said another possibility for the national security job is James B. Steinberg, a close Obama adviser who was deputy national security adviser to Clinton, but Jones appears to be the strong favorite.

Sources also said yesterday that Rep. Raul M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.) has emerged as a leading contender for interior secretary. The son of a migrant worker who grew up in Tucson, Grijalva boasts a strong environmental record and chairs the House Natural Resources subcommittee on national parks, forests and public lands.

Also yesterday, transition officials announced the selection of five new White House staff members.

Patrick Gaspard, a longtime labor activist, will be the White House political director. He served as national political director for much of Obama's general-election campaign and was named deputy director of personnel for the transition effort. Prior to his work with Obama, Gaspard was a political operative for the Service Employees International Union.

Vice President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. named Cynthia Hogan as his counsel. She has been his legal adviser since 1991, when she became a counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Biden also named Moises V. Vela Jr. as his director of administration. Vela, a businessman in Denver, was a chief financial officer and senior adviser on Hispanic affairs for Vice President Al Gore.

Incoming first lady Michelle Obama has tapped Jackie Norris, who was Iowa state director for the Obama campaign, to be her chief of staff. Norris, a high school government and history teacher and longtime Iowa Democrat, was Iowa political director for Gore's 2000 presidential campaign and was finance director for future Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack in 1998.

In addition, the vice president-elect's wife, Jill Biden, has named Catherine M. Russell to be her chief of staff. A former adviser to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, she served as chief of staff for Jill Biden during the campaign and is the wife of Thomas E. Donilon, a co-chairman of Obama's transition team for the State Department.

Staff writers Michael A. Fletcher and Walter Pincus and staff researcher Madonna Lebling contributed to this report.