So Brian Deese will likely lead the National Economics Council. Deese spent the last few years running "sustainable investing" at BlackRock, which kicked off controversy among climate activists, but I think this is good news for climate policy, for a simple reason:
Even if Deese isn't your ideal of climate policymaker, he's the only plausible candidate for NEC whose actual focus and expertise is climate policy. And a WH where the NEC is led by a climate hawk is going to be quite different than one where climate is siloed elsewhere.
To lay my biases on the table first: I reported on Deese's work throughout the Obama administration, and have a lot of respect for him as someone who gets hard things done in government, wants to do the right thing, and grasps policy debates unnervingly fully and quickly.
I also wish people, like Deese, who want to hold high-up positions in government would stop going to places like BlackRock in their out-years, because whatever the merits of the individual jobs they take, the revolving door builds cynicism about government.
That said: NEC is hugely important. It organizes the options the president sees, it structures WH policy debates and priorities. It's the nerve center for all economic policymaking, organizing the information from the other organs of government.
NEC usually goes to an economic policymaker. Larry Summers, Gene Sperling, and Jeff Zients ran it for Obama. There were lots of economic policymakers Biden could've tapped who wouldn't have sparked controversy in climate Twitter because they don't focus on climate.
Deese came up in the Obama administration through the NEC, but turned to focus on climate over time, taking the portfolio over from John Podesta. So he's unusual in that he's got NEC experience but, at this point, has spent more time working on climate policy.
One truism of politics is that ideology and experience get debated a lot but prioritization is often the key thing. And a WH where NEC is led by Deese, whose main issue is climate, is going to prioritize climate more one where NEC is led by any of the other obvious candidates.
People around Biden have talked about running a "climate administration," where climate is embedded in everything they do. Choosing a climate policymaker to lead NEC suggests, to me, that they mean it, because NEC has its hands on so many realms of policy. nytimes.com/2020/11/17/cli…
Also, I didn't know until all this that @BillMcKibben literally officiated his wedding (and this whole thread is worth a read, for a more personal perspective on Deese).
https://twitter.com/billmckibben/status/1331945322189352960
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