President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr plans to name Janet L. Yellen as treasury secretary, a nomination that would put a woman in charge of the treasury for the first time in its 231-year history.
The expected appointment came as Biden moved to fill other top cabinet roles, selecting Alejandro Mayorkas as the first Latino to lead the department of homeland security and Avril Haines as the first woman to be the director of national intelligence.
Biden is also expected to create a new post of international climate envoy and tap John Kerry, a former secretary of state who was a chief negotiator for the US on the Paris climate change accord.
The emerging diplomatic, intelligence and economic teams, as outlined by transition officials, reunite a group of former senior officials from the Obama administration. Most worked closely together at the state department and the White House and in several cases have close ties to Biden dating back years.
Biden will officially announce some of them at an event in Wilmington, Delaware, on Tuesday.
They share a belief in the core principles of the Democratic foreign policy establishment: international cooperation, strong US alliances and leadership, but a wariness of foreign interventions after the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The transition office confirmed reports on Sunday night that Biden will nominate Antony J. Blinken to be secretary of state and Jake Sullivan as national security adviser.
Biden will also nominate Linda Thomas-Greenfield to be ambassador to the UN and restore the job to cabinet-level status, giving Thomas-Greenfield, who is African-American, a seat on his National Security Council.
The racial and gender mix of the expected nominees also reflects Biden’s stated commitment to diversity, which has lagged notoriously in the worlds of foreign policy and national security.
