A diverse administration representative of American society, with John Kerry as climate envoy: this is what the Biden-Harris presidency will look like.
In a transition process that has been anything but conventional, on Monday 23 November the next president of the United States Joe Biden officially announced the first appointments for his future administration.
Biden won the elections on 3 November, securing nearly 80 million votes and 306 electoral college votes, 36 more than the 270 threshold needed to claim the White House. Despite the Democrat's victory having been widely certified, Donald Trump's staff only began formally acknowledging defeat on 23 November, and it appears the outgoing president has no intention of delivering a concession speech.
In recent weeks, his legal team, led by former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, filed a series of lawsuits aimed at proving that the election had in fact been rigged and manipulated in favour of the Democrats. The claims, however, do not appear to be supported by the facts, and so far all the cases have been dismissed by the courts with jurisdiction.
Against a backdrop marked by tensions and communication difficulties, President-elect Biden named the first six members of his administration, which is preparing to take office on 20 January. Throughout his electoral campaign, Biden had promised to build a diverse team representative of American society. It was partly for this reason that Kamala Harris was chosen as vice president, making her the first woman to hold the second most important office in the country.
The principle of diversity was upheld in the first round of appointments. Alejandro Mayorkas will be the first Latino secretary to lead the Department of Homeland Security, which he had already managed as deputy secretary between 2013 and 2016, during the presidency of Barack Obama. Among other responsibilities, the department also handles a range of issues related to immigration, a historically sensitive topic in the United States.
Avril Haines will become the first woman to lead the National Intelligence Agency, having previously served as Deputy Director of the CIA and held several positions in the Obama administration.
The second woman to join the Biden-Harris administration is Linda Thomas-Greenfield, a career diplomat who will serve as United States Ambassador to the United Nations. Thomas-Greenfield had been appointed Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs during the Obama presidency, but President Trump's staff subsequently asked her to step down from the role.
The next Secretary of State — a role comparable to a foreign minister — will be Antony Blinken, who served as deputy head of the same department in the final years of the previous Democratic administration. He will be tasked with rebuilding the international alliances weakened by the Trump presidency, defined by the motto America first. Joining Blinken as National Security Advisor will be Jake Sullivan, who previously served as an adviser to then Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Biden has also created a new role dedicated entirely to managing the climate emergency: John Kerry, Secretary of State under the Obama administration, will serve as "Presidential Envoy for Climate" within the National Security Council.
Kerry is a respected figure in the Democratic establishment: in 2004 he was the party's presidential candidate — ultimately defeated by Republican George W. Bush — and he played a fundamental role in the negotiations for the Paris Agreement on climate, which the United States signed in 2016. One of Kerry's first tasks will be to bring the country back into the agreement, following the withdrawal decided by President Donald Trump, which came into effect on 4 November.
In November 2019, Kerry also launched World war zero, a bipartisan coalition aimed at halting the rise in CO2 emissions by 2050, supported by, among others, Leonardo DiCaprio, Sting, and former presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter.
The creation of a dedicated role for managing climate change reflects the interest in the environment that Biden showed during his electoral campaign: the president-elect proposed a programme focused on the energy revolution and environmental justice, through which he promises to invest approximately €1,400 billion over the next ten years to ensure that the United States uses only energy from renewable sources by 2050.
Press sources also report that Biden intends to choose Janet Yellen, former chair of the Federal Reserve, as Treasury Secretary: she would be the first woman to lead the country's finances.
With the exception of Kerry and Sullivan, all other appointments will need to be ratified by the Senate, whose composition remains uncertain. Following the 3 November elections, the Democrats currently hold 48 seats, compared to the 50 held by the Republicans. However, two seats in Georgia are still to be filled, with the runoff election scheduled for 5 January. Should both Democratic candidates win on that occasion, the Senate would be split evenly, in which case the final say would rest with Vice President Kamala Harris. Otherwise, the majority would remain in Republican hands.
