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Future Chief of Staff Jeff Zients
Photo: Patrick Semansky / dpa
The new chief of staff of US President Joe Biden will be his former corona officer Jeff Zients.
The White House has confirmed this important change in personnel.
Zients, 56, advised Biden from January 2021 to April 2022 on how to deal with the corona pandemic.
He was also responsible for the vaccination campaign in the USA, but was already working in important positions for the US government during Barack Obama's presidency.
"I've seen Jeff Zients tackle some of the government's toughest challenges," Biden said in a statement.
As chief of staff, Zients assumes a central position in the government;
he organizes the President's day-to-day government and also takes care of his crisis management.
Multi-millionaire Zients has also served as a board member at Facebook and as a manager at investment firm Portfolio Logic.
Zients succeeds 61-year-old Ron Klain, a longtime Biden confidant, who is stepping down from the post after two years.
Klain has been a powerful key figure in the White House since Biden took office in January 2021 and has been instrumental in Biden's legislative successes.
It is common in the US for chiefs of staff not to remain in office for the entire term of a president.
Biden's predecessor Donald Trump, for example, had four chiefs of staff in four years in office.
Continuity in Biden's governing team
With Klain, however, Biden loses an important employee and close confidante.
Biden has worked with Klain for decades -- he's had him by his side as a senator, vice president, and president.
"Ron and I have been through some real battles together over the past 36 years," Biden said.
"If you're in the trenches with someone as long as I've been with Ron, you really get to know that person."
Biden, 80, plans to announce in the coming weeks or months whether he will run for a second term in 2024.
His government team is characterized - especially in comparison to Trump's tenure - by very high consistency.
There were no resignations or dismissals of ministers during Biden's tenure.
The most important employee to date, who left the 80-year-old, was his press secretary Jen Psaki in May 2022. Psaki wanted to spend more time with her family and switched to television.
aeh/dpa/AFP/Reuters
