Daschle Expected to Bring Experience, ‘Steel of Spine’ to HHS Post

Colleagues describe Tom Daschle, President-elect Barack Obama’s choice for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, as calm, clear-thinking, knowledgeable and respected—all qualities that should serve him well if he is confirmed to manage the sprawling government bureaucracy that embraces Medicare, Medicaid, the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Institutes of Health.

“He has steel in his spine, despite his reasonable and modest demeanor,” Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., has said of Daschle.

And Daschle will need that steely resolve as he wrestles with enormous issues—from fashioning a plan to cover 46 million uninsured Americans to holding down Medicare’s costs. As HHS secretary he would be responsible for shoring up the FDA’s battered credibility on drug and food safety as well as championing changes that would permit the government to negotiate with drug companies for lower drug prices for Medicare Part D—all issues Obama listed as priorities in his campaign.

The South Dakota Democrat, an early supporter and close adviser of Obama’s, wrote a book on health care this year, Critical: What We Can Do About the Health Care Crisis. The United States, Daschle wrote, is “the only industrialized nation that does not guarantee necessary health care to all of its citizens. It is stunning and shameful.”

With decades of experience on Capitol Hill as a legislative aide, House member, senator and finally Democratic Senate leader, Daschle understands the arcane workings of Congress. It was there that he earned his reputation as a skilled politician who knows how to build consensus, blunt the assault of partisanship and steer a bill to passage. Experts say his appointment is a clear signal that Obama plans to make comprehensive health care reform a priority. Indeed, many predict Daschle will be the president’s point man for that huge undertaking, helping to shepherd health care reform through Congress.

AARP, whose Divided We Fail campaign has made a public push for congressional action on health care and the uninsured, hailed the appointment. The former senator “would bring a wealth of experience to HHS as the new Congress and administration begin their work to solve our health care crisis,” says Nancy LeaMond, AARP’s executive vice president.

“Tom Daschle has been a leader on health care policy for a long time,” DeAnn Friedholm, Consumers Union’s campaign director for health care reform, said in a press statement. “Someone of his stature and clout, combined with his passion and expertise in health care, is an exciting choice. It’s a good sign the Obama administration is serious about addressing the nation’s health care crisis.” Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), a member of the centrist Republican Main Street Partnership, says of the candidate: “Tom Daschle has a wealth of experience, and I enjoyed working with him in the Senate.”

After losing his reelection bid in 2004, Daschle remained in Washington as a fellow at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank. He also has served on the board of the Mayo Clinic and as an adviser at the law firm of Alston & Bird, which lobbies for a number of clients in the health care industry. According to the New York Times, the administration may ask Daschle, who was not a registered lobbyist, to recuse himself from any matters that might arise related to former clients.

As HHS secretary, Daschle, who currently heads the Obama transition team’s health care policy group, would oversee a massive department with some 65,000 employees and a budget of more than $707 billion.

In his book, Daschle wrote: “Health care is a complex topic but we have to face a simple truth: We’re paying top dollar for mediocre results.”

He suggests a new entity to integrate public and private health care systems and take care of regulatory details that Congress now gets bogged down in discussing.

Daschle puts forward the idea of a board, modeled on the Federal Reserve, that would “offer a public framework within which a private health care system can operate more effectively and efficiently—insulated from political pressure yet accountable to elected officials and the American people.”

Of course, just what plan the Obama administration will put forward remains to be seen.

Barbara Basler is a senior editor at AARP Bulletin Today.