Americas

Americas

Obama budget chief to resign: Report

22 June 2010 17:27 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. The US president Barack Obama’s budget director Peter Orszag has planned to step down within a few weeks to become the first member of the Democratic White House team to resign, APA reports quoting presstv.ir website.

Democratic sources said late on Monday that Orszag’s departure was expected as he had never intended to keep the job for more than two years.

He wants to leave before the next budget season begins in July, sources said AFP reported.

Kenneth Baer, a spokesman for the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), however, refrained from confirming Orszag’s resignation saying, "Peter is focused on his work, not on Washington speculation."

Orszag has been at the helm of OMB since Obama’s inauguration in January 2009. He has played an important role in hammering out Obama’s economic stimulus bill and his gigantic healthcare overhaul.

Speculations are high that Laura D’Andrea Tyson, an economist of the University of California at Berkeley, and Gene Sperling, counselor to Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, are the potential successors. The two have worked as White House economic advisers during the administration of former President Bill Clinton.

Another candidate is Robert Greenstein, executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Reuters reported.