Source: Karen Townsend
Two more top-level staffers are leaving the White House. Resignations began in February and as the weeks go by, more are heading for the exits. Up until then it was mostly Kamala's staff leaving her office in a steady flow. Look for more White House staff to suddenly need more time with the family or secure a more lucrative job in the private sector. November is coming and working in the White House is not going to be so much fun anymore.
The latest to announce resignations but not actually leave yet are deputy White House communications director, Pili Tobar and White House climate adviser Gina McCarthy. Both are said to be leaving "soon." McCarthy announced her resignation two weeks ago but somehow I missed it. It's good news for those of us who oppose overregulation of the oil and gas industry for the sake of halting exploration and drilling.
Axios is reporting on both of the resignations. Earlier this week, I wrote about Cedric Richmond, director of the White House office of Public Engagement, being asked to leave the White House and go work with the DNC to try and save incumbent Democrats in the November midterm elections. Good luck with that, Cedric!
At the White House, Tobar managed a communications portfolio that included immigration, climate and LGBTQI+ issues, among others.
Born in Florida and raised, in part, in Guatemala, Tobar also served as a bilingual spokesperson in Spanish.
Tobar joined the White House from the Biden campaign, where she led the coalitions communications team.
"Pili has been a tremendous asset to our team, and she will be deeply missed," said Kate Bedingfield, White House communications director.
Tobar said in a statement: "It has been the privilege of a lifetime to work for President Biden and Vice President [Kamala] Harris in the White House, and on the campaign."
"After nearly three years of serving with this incredible team, I am excited to return to the private sector and spend some much-needed time with my daughter, Lily, my wife, Christina, our family and friends."
Frankly, this White House can use all the help it can get when it comes to the communications team. We already know that Baghdad Jen is leaving to go work for MSNBC soon-ish.
The Washington Post reported on McCarthy's resignation. It's reported that she will likely be replaced by Ali Zaidi, her deputy. Her cabinet level position was created by Biden to show how serious he is about climate change, a sop to the progressive left in his party. She is the domestic counterpart to John Kerry who also has a position created by Biden – special presidential envoy for climate – at the State Department. That just sounds like a phony title, doesn't it?
The White House is remaining quiet.
"We have no personnel announcements to make," White House spokesman Vedant Patel said in a statement. "Gina and her entire team continue to be laser focused on delivering on President Biden's clean energy agenda."
McCarthy is an Obama alum, having served as the head of the EPA during his administration. She's been working to undo all that Team Trump did to reduce overzealous environmental regulations. Good riddance.
Biden chose McCarthy in part because of her years leading the Environmental Protection Agency in the Obama administration, when she helped enact some of the toughest regulations to curb greenhouse gases from power plants and vehicles the country had ever seen. But McCarthy had privately signaled from the start she would only return to government for a brief stint, though the exact timing of her departure remains unclear.
Zaidi, the deputy White House national climate adviser, previously served as New York's deputy secretary for energy and environment and held multiple climate-focused roles in the Obama administration.
WaPo admits what many of us are saying about these top-level resignations. The midterm elections are going to be brutal for the White House. Big progressive bills on climate change and other far left policy agendas will be stopped in their tracks by a Republican majority in the House and possibly in the Senate. The writing is on the wall and the rats are fleeing a sinking ship.
Then there are the upcoming midterm elections in November. Although Democrats have coalesced around a strategy of blaming rising gasoline prices on oil companies and Russia's war in Ukraine, voters may vent their frustrations on the party in power. If Democrats lose control of Congress, it could paralyze their climate agenda, leaving it with scarcely any supporters among Republicans calling for massive increases in domestic oil and gas production.
The White House thinks Americans are stupid. They want us to believe that Putin is to blame for all of Biden's failures, or to blame Republicans. Republicans are not in the majority in either the House or the Senate, though, and there are only Democrats to blame for the mess we're in. Americans are not, in fact, stupid and Biden's poor polling numbers show that no one is buying what Biden's selling.
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