Obama to name Sperling head of National Economic Council

The announcement is set for the Prince George's County suburb of Landover, where Obama plans to visit a window company that is taking advantage of a new tax break for businesses that Obama pushed through Congress last month.

Obama also plans to announce other changes to his economic team -- including the appointment of University of Maryland economist Katharine G. Abraham to the three-member Council of Economic Advisers -- amid a broader shakeup of the White House in preparation for the 2012 presidential campaign.

Sperling, currently a senior counselor to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, replaces Lawrence Summers, a respected economist who served as Clinton's treasury secretary and as president of Harvard University before that.

Sperling is not an economist by training. But he is valued as a savvy and knowledgable political player. His experience negotiating successfully with Republicans may prove useful as the administration shifts away from a highly creative period of developing policies to counteract the recent recession and hunkers down for a protracted fight over government spending, taxes and the fate of Obama's new health-care law.

An enthusiastic campaign warrior who advised 2004 Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry, as well as Bill Clinton and other Democrats going back to the days of Michael Dukakis, Sperling is also seen as an able communicator, who can shape the administration's message and convey it to the public and on Capitol Hill.

Obama also plans Friday to announce other changes on the economic team. Jason Furman, who has served as Summers' deputy on the NEC since the start of the administration, will receive a new title: principal deputy director of the NEC and assistant to the president for economic policy. Heather Higginbottom, who is currently deputy director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, will move to the White House budget office as deputy director under Jacob Lew, another Clinton veteran. Higginbottom's post requires Senate confirmation.
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And Obama will nominate Abraham to the CEA, a post that also requires Senate confirmation. Abraham is a professor in the Joint Program in Survey Methodology and a faculty associate in the Population Research Center at the University of Maryland. A graduate of Harvard and Iowa State, Abraham served as commissioner for the Bureau of Labor Statistics in the U.S. Labor Department from 1993 to 2001.