President Nominates Sally Jewell for Interior Secretary
President Obama announced on February 6th that he has nominated Sally Jewell to be the next Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior. Ms. Jewell has been the president and CEO of outdoor retailer Recreational Equipment Inc. (REI) since 2005. Prior to joining REI, Ms. Jewell worked as an engineer for Mobil Oil Corp. for three years after graduating from college. She also spent nearly twenty years in the commercial banking industry, culminating with her becoming president of Washington Mutual’s commercial banking group. President Obama said that Ms. Jewell “knows the link between conservation and good jobs. She knows that there’s no contradiction between being good stewards of the land and our economic progress; that in fact, those two things need to go hand in hand.” Senate confirmation hearings will begin in the next few weeks.