Foxy Spokesman

"President Bush hates responding to the press, hates responding to political enemies -- he thinks it's beneath him," Snow said on Fox News in March. "He's got a stubborn streak." What the president needed, he said, was "a series of vigorous defenses" of his position.

Brit Hume, Fox's Washington managing editor, said he was "a little surprised" that Snow would give up his new radio show to take one of the capital's most demanding jobs.

"I think he's excited by the idea of being on the inside," Hume said. "He believes he will be at the table when decisions are made. For someone of his bent, that's too good to pass up."

Dee Dee Myers, a press secretary in the Clinton White House, said that if Bush wants smoother relations with journalists, "Tony has stature. He understands how the press works from both sides. He has a big personality, and that can be helpful." But she noted that Snow has "a long paper trail" and would have to defend policies he has criticized.

Outgoing spokesman Scott McClellan, whose tight-lipped style led to strained relations with reporters, announced last week that he is stepping down as part of a White House reorganization being spearheaded by the new chief of staff, Joshua B. Bolten. Snow will be the first career journalist to serve in the position since President Gerald R. Ford tapped Ron Nessen, an NBC correspondent, in 1974.

A senior administration official said last night that Bush is aware of the "perception of disdain for the institution of the media" on the part of the White House and wants a spokesman who will forge "a good working relationship" with journalists.

The official said the president is also looking for "a forceful advocate for the type of historical change he's trying to accomplish" and added: "We believe Tony fits the bill in both areas. He has a lot of experience on the air, which with the evolution of the briefings is something you have to take into consideration."

The last remaining obstacle faded when Snow got the results of a CAT scan that showed no recurrence of the cancer that forced him to have his colon surgically removed last year, the sources said.

Snow, 50, is particularly interested in economic and immigration issues. He intends to insist on greater access for White House reporters, said sources familiar with his plans. He has described the press corps as a beast that must be constantly fed. In a December 2000 column in the Washington Times, he referred to "Democrats and journalists (but I repeat myself)."

He has told associates he plans to function as an advocate for reporters, an approach that would run counter to the administration's previous philosophy about the position.

The question of whether to take the job -- which includes a substantial cut from his media earnings, to $161,000 -- weighed so heavily on Snow that he lost several pounds in a week. His doctors, who refashioned his small intestine to function as a colon, had given him the green light to take the job; one joked that it might give him heartburn but not cancer.

William Kristol, who worked with Snow in the White House of George H.W. Bush and was a regular panelist on "Fox News Sunday" when Snow anchored the show, invoked the Fox News slogan in saying: "It will be good to have a fair and balanced press secretary.