White House Policy Councils

As the federal government has ballooned in size over the past century, it has become increasingly difficult for the President alone to direct his agenda across the executive branch.

Three White House policy councils have come into existence to help the President to control the bureaucracy and ensure continued alignment between agency leadership and White House priorities. Those councils—as pre- viewed above—are the NSC, NEC, and DPC. Each is headed by an Assistant to the President and performs three significant functions.

Policy Coordination. The primary role of the policy councils is to coordinate the development of Administration policy. This frequently includes developing significant legislative priorities, coordinating policy decisions that impact multiple departments and agencies, and at times coordinating policy decisions within a single department or agency. This process must ensure that all relevant offices are included; that competing or conflicting opinions are thoroughly discussed and evaluated; and, when there is disagreement among White House senior staff or among Cabinet members, a well-structured question is presented to the President for an intermediate or final decision.

Policy Advice. By virtue of working in the White House, the heads of the three policy councils will also function as independent policy advisers to the President. This aspect of the role will vary depending on the individual in this position and the President’s governing philosophy. Incumbents have ranged from “honest brokers,” who mostly coordinate and ensure that all opinions are fairly presented to the President, to “policy deciders,” who largely drive a given policy topic on behalf of the President. Policy Implementation. The policy councils also manage and mediate the implementation of previous policy decisions. Implementation of a new statute or an executive order frequently takes years and involves many distinct and more granular policy decisions along the way. It is essential to have a centralized process for evaluating and coordinating these decisions, especially if they involve more than one Cabinet department or agency with differing opinions on the best approach for securing the President’s goals.

The above functions have recently been managed by policy councils through a tiered interagency policy process. This process helps to identify differences of opinion and reach a decision without having to take every issue to the President. It can be used to address a single question or monitor a recurring issue on an ongoing basis. Typically, the process involves multiple Cabinet departments and agencies that have a pertinent role, policy interest, or disagreement. Each policy council’s process could involve the following committees:

Deputies Committee (DC). A DC is a meeting of presidentially appointed executives chaired by the policy council’s Deputy Assistant to the President and relevant Deputy Secretaries. It evaluates the options produced by the PCC and frequently directs the PCC to add, expand, or reevaluate an option or even to reach a compromise and resolve an issue at that level. Principals Committee (PC). When questions are not resolved by a DC, the Director of the Policy Council will chair a PC, which is attended by the relevant Cabinet Secretaries and senior White House political staff. This is the final opportunity for the President’s most senior advisers to discuss the question, make sure that each principal’s position is carefully understood, and see whether consensus or a compromise might be reached. If not, the Chief of Staff’s office will schedule time for the PC to meet with the President for a final decision. Despite having seemingly clear and separate portfolios, the three policy coun- cils frequently have areas of overlap, which can result in confusion, duplication, or conflict. For example, there are the areas of immigration and border security Policy Coordinating Committee (PCC). A PCC is led by a Special Assistant to the President from the policy council and includes political Assistant Secretary–level experts from the relevant departments, agencies, or offices. The purpose is to determine where consensus exists, clearly identify where there are differing opinions, and develop options for resolving the remaining questions. If no outstanding questions or disagreements exist, the PCC may resolve the issue and move toward implementation at the agency level.

(either NSC or DPC); health care, energy, and environment (either NEC or DPC); and trade and international economic policy (either NSC or NEC). Identifying these potentially problematic areas and assigning policy responsibilities to only one council where possible will help to speed up the policy-coordination process. While other chapters will cover specific policy goals for each department or agency, incoming policy councils will need to move rapidly to lead policy processes around cross-cutting agency topics, including countering China, enforcing immi- gration laws, reversing regulatory policies in order to promote energy production, combating the Left’s aggressive attacks on life and religious liberty, and confronting “wokeism” throughout the federal government.

National Security Council. The NSC is intended to be an interdepartmen- tal body within the White House that can set national security policy with a whole-of-government approach. Unlike the other policy councils, the NSC was established by statute.8 Statutory members and advisers who are currently part of the NSC include the President and Vice President; the Secretaries of State, Defense, and Energy; the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and the Director of National Intelligence.9

The NSC staff, and particularly the National Security Adviser, should be vetted for foreign and security policy experience and insight. The National Secu- rity Adviser and NSC staff advise the President on matters of foreign policy and national security, serve as an information conduit in times of crisis, and as liaisons ensuring that written communications are properly shared among NSC members. Special attention should be given to the use of detailees to staff the NSC. In recent years, the NSC’s staff size has been rightsized from its peak of 400 in 2015 down to 100–150 professional members. The next Administration should try to limit the number of detailees to ensure more direct presidential control. National Economic Council. The NEC was established in 1993 by executive order and has four key functions:

To “coordinate the economic policy-making process with respect to domestic and international economic issues.” To “coordinate economic policy advice to the President.” To “ensure that policy decisions and programs are consistent with the President’s stated goals” and “that those goals are being effectively pursued.” To “monitor implementation of the President’s economic policy agenda.”10 The NEC Director coordinates and implements the President’s economic policy objectives by working with Cabinet secretaries, their departments, and multiple agencies. The Director is supported by a staff of policy experts in various fields, including infrastructure, manufacturing, research and development, agriculture, small business, financial regulation, housing, technology and innovation, and fiscal policy.

The NEC considers economic policy matters, and the DPC typically considers anything related to domestic matters with the exception of economic policy mat- ters. It also differs from the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA). Whereas the NEC is in charge of policy development, the CEA acts as the White House’s internal research arm for economic analysis. It is therefore critically important to find people with the right qualifica- tions to head both the NEC and the CEA. The CEA is almost always led by a well-known academic economist, and the NEC is regularly led by someone with expertise in directing the President’s economic policy process. Those who have served in the role have ranged from former CEOs of the nation’s largest invest- ment firms to financial-services industry managers to seasoned congressional staffers who have managed the economic policy issues for top financial and tax-writing committees.

Domestic Policy Council. The Domestic Policy Council (DPC) consists of advisers to the President on noneconomic domestic policy issues as well as inter- national issues with a significant domestic component (such as immigration). It is one of the primary policy councils serving the President along with the NSC and NEC. The Director serves as the principal DPC adviser to the President, along with members of the Cabinet, and the Deputy Director chairs the committee respon- sible for coordinating domestic policy development at the Deputy Secretary level. In this respect, both the Director and the Deputy Director have critical institu- tional functions that affect the development of domestic policy throughout the Administration.

The DPC also has policy experts (for example, Special Assistants to the Presi- dent or SAPs) who are responsible for developing and coordinating, as well as for advising the President, on specific issues. It is essential that DPC policy expertise reflect the most prominent issues that are before the Administration: issues such as the environment, health care, housing, and immigration. In addition, DPC SAPs should demonstrate a working knowledge of the rulemaking process (although they need not necessarily be experts on regulation) because a working knowledge of the rulemaking process will facilitate the DPC’s effectiveness in coordinating Administration policy.

The DPC also needs to work closely with other offices within the Executive Office of the President to promote economic opportunity and private-sector inno- vation. This includes working with the Office of Management and Budget and its Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs as well as the Council of Economic Advisers, Council on Environmental Quality, and Office of Science and Technology Policy. To this end, the Director should chair a standing meeting with the princi- pals from each of the other EOP offices to enhance coordination from within the White House.

Several areas will be especially important as the DPC works to develop a well-defined domestic policy agenda. One is the promotion of innovation as a foundation for economic growth and opportunity. The President should establish an economic opportunity working group, chaired by the DPC Director, to coordi- nate the development of policies that promote economic opportunity. Another important area is the promotion of health care reform to bring down costs for the American people and the pressure that spending on health programs puts on the federal budget. Finally, DPC should coordinate with the NSC on a policy agenda to enhance border security.