Obama's Homeland Security choice has wide experience

WASHINGTON - President-elect Barack Obama's expected nominee for Homeland Security secretary, Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, helped investigate the biggest U.S. terrorist attack before Sept. 11, 2001 - the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing - and has been a national leader on immigration and border-security issues.

Two Democratic sources familiar with the selection process, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter, said yesterday that Napolitano, who turns 51 next week, was Obama's choice to head the sprawling, five-year-old Department of Homeland Security.

Obama's election rival, Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.), quickly hailed Napolitano's expected nomination, saying that he had called her to congratulate her and that "I hope she is quickly confirmed."

McCain praised Napolitano's experience; she is also a former state attorney general and U.S. attorney.

The anticipated announcement was well-received by several experts in the immigration and homeland-security fields. DHS encompasses customs and immigration, disaster response, the Coast Guard, the Secret Service, the Transportation Security Administration, nuclear detection, technology and threat-assessment programs.

Obama's transition team made no announcement yesterday about Napolitano, who was an early backer of Obama's presidential campaign.

Transition spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter did issue a statement ending speculation that Obama's campaign-finance chairwoman, Chicago billionaire and Hyatt family heir Penny Pritzker, might become his commerce secretary. Cutter said Pritzker would remain an economic adviser to Obama but "has decided that given her family and business commitments, she is not interested in serving at this time."

Meanwhile, Obama's White House chief of staff, Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D., Ill.), spent much of the day on Capitol Hill holding closed-door meetings with Senate Republican leaders and making individual visits to House GOP leaders.

"I told them I would like to welcome their ideas, we would like to welcome their ideas on a host of fronts, be that in the area of education, health care, taxes, energy policy, national security," Emanuel said. "Give us those ideas as we are formulating what we are going to do in the Obama administration."

Napolitano first gained attention as a lawyer representing Anita Hill, who made allegations of sexual harassment against Clarence Thomas during his 1991 Supreme Court confirmation hearings.

Two years later, President Bill Clinton named her U.S. attorney for Arizona. Her office investigated Michael Fortier of Arizona for his role in the 1995 bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City, which killed 168 people. Fortier pleaded guilty to failing to warn authorities of the conspiracy and testified against his friends Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, who were convicted in the bombing.

The Associated Press reported that while Napolitano was U.S. attorney, the Justice Department decided not to prosecute McCain's wife, Cindy, for prescription-drug theft. However, a Napolitano spokeswoman told the AP that Napolitano had recused herself from the case because she had not yet been confirmed by the Senate.

Napolitano went on to serve as state attorney general before being elected governor in 2002; she was reelected in 2006.

She was the first woman to head the National Governors Association and the first governor to call for deploying the National Guard along the border at federal expense. She has supported a comprehensive immigration-law overhaul that, as favored by McCain and Obama, would allow for some path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.

David Heyman, director and senior fellow of the homeland security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a center-right think tank, called Napolitano an excellent choice, saying she embodied a good mix of political skill and law-enforcement training and was well-respected among governors.

President-elect

Barack Obama is on track to nominate Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state after Thanksgiving, an aide to his transition team said yesterday.

A week after

the former primary rivals secretly met to discuss the idea of Clinton becoming the nation's top diplomat, the two sides were moving quickly toward making it a reality, barring any unforeseen problems.

The aide said

they had worked out financial-

disclosure issues that involved her husband, former President Bill Clinton, and his foundation's complicated international funding. The aide said Obama and Hillary Clinton have had substantive conversations about the State Department post.

Possible appointments

for Obama's national security team are being worked out, with no formal announcements before Thanksgiving, the aide said.

Clinton spokesman

Philippe Reines would not comment last night. Separately, campaign-

finance reports show that Clinton reduced her presidential campaign debt to less than $7.5 million as of Nov. 1. As a cabinet member, she would face fund-raising restrictions to retire her debt.

- Associated Press