Subject: Biden & Obama staff in the transition and policy working group team leads
From: "Cassandra Butts" <[email-masked]>
To: "[email-masked]" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2008 23:35:22 -0400

John,

There was some confusion as to whether the Biden Senate staff could join the
transition in a role other than detailees. After talking to Bob, we've
concluded that the Obama and Biden staff can work on the transition and
continue to be payed by the Senate as long as they have the permission of
their boss and are working on issues related to their senate
responsibilities. This was the working assumption for the Obama staff, and
we have communicated this to the Biden staff.

Also, I need your input on staffing the team lead positions on the policy
working groups post-election. Linda, Jeanne, Alex and Tino have all
expressed an interest in continuing in their lead roles, but none are
available to play their roles full time during the course of the transition.
Between Alex and Tino, they can provide combined full-time coverage for the
position, and it seems very natural to allow them to continue in their
current role as co-leads. Jeanne can be in town on Wednesday, Thursday and
Friday, but will be teaching in Austin on Monday and Tuesday. Sen. Daschle
and Jeanne have recommended that Mark Childress cover the time that Jeanne
isn't available, but he will need to deregister as a federally lobbyist
before he can be identified in a lead role for the transition. Finally,
Linda is available but can not do full-time duty. I propose that she split
the lead role with Robert Gordon. One value in keeping our existing working
group leads post-election is that none will require salaries for the
transition, but there is a question as to whether we will pay for their
travel related to their work for the transition.

Best,
Cassandra