The Senate voted 57-40 Thursday to approve the nomination of Cass Sunstein to be administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, ending a months-long debate over Sunstein’s writings as a professor and his ideological views. At least two senators had placed holds on Sunstein’s nomination, due to concerns about his opinions on gun control and animal rights. Sunstein, a Harvard University professor, met with the senators, Saxby Chambliss of Georgia and John Cornyn of Texas, and assured them he respected the Second Amendment and would not limit hunting or impose stricter gun control. The holds were then lifted.…
Browsing: OIRA
We reported back in January that the president planned to nominate Harvard professor Cass Sunstein to head OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. So where’s his nomination? The White House’s nominations list doesn’t mention Sunstein. (In fact, if you search for him on the White House Web site, you won’t get any results.) The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs committee tells me it hasn’t heard a word about Sunstein’s nomination. And the White House hasn’t responded to a request for comment.
One of President-elect Barack Obama’s most interesting nominations is Cass Sunstein, his pick to head OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Cass Sunstein, a Harvard University law professor and Barack Obama’s pick to head OIRA. We’ll profile him in next Monday’s Federal Times — like I did this week with Nancy Killefer, Obama’s new chief performance officer — but a few early thoughts: Sunstein is a law professor at Harvard University; before that, he taught at the University of Chicago. He’s an old friend of the president-elect from his UChicago teaching days. And he’s written extensively on government regulation,…