 President-elect Bush speaks in theWhite House Rose Garden accompanied by his wifeBarbara, President andFirst Lady Ronald andNancy Reagan, as well as Vice President-electDan Quayle and his wifeMarilyn. | |
| Date of election | November 8, 1988 |
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| Inauguration date | January 20, 1989 |
| President-elect | George H. W. Bush (Republican) |
| Vice president-elect | Dan Quayle (Republican) |
| Outgoing president | Ronald Reagan (Republican) |
| Outgoing vice president | George H. W. Bush (Republican) |
| Headquarters | Washington, D.C. |
Co-directors | Craig L. Fuller andRobert Teeter |
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Thepresidential transition ofGeorge H. W. Bush began when then-Vice President Bush won the United States1988 United States presidential election, becoming thepresident-elect, and ended when Bush wasinaugurated on January 20, 1989.
As of 2024–25, this was the last instance of a "friendly takeover", in which the outgoing president and the president-elect were of the samepolitical party and the last transition of an incumbent vice president.
This transition was an instance of a "friendly takeover", a term used for a presidential transition in which both the outgoing and incoming presidents are of the same political party.[1][2][3][4] In November 1988,Chase Untermeyer would embrace describing the Bush transition with this term.[4] In this instance, both the outgoingRonald Reagan and the incoming Bush wereRepublicans, and Bush was the incumbentvice president, having served under Reagan since 1981. This was the eleventh instance of a post-election "friendly takeover" in United States history,[5] and the first instance of one sinceHerbert Hoover, inhis presidential transition, succeededCalvin Coolidge.[6][4] This was also the first presidential transition in which an outgoing president was handing-over power to their own vice president since the 1836–37 transition, whenAndrew Jackson was succeeded by his vice presidentMartin Van Buren.[7][8]
Ahead of the 1988 election, there was bipartisan agreement that changes needed to be made to presidential transitions in order to make them easier. This agreement between parties, perhaps, was attributable to the fact that there would be a presidential transition occurring in the year 1988, since President Reagan wasterm-limited.[9] One of the changes being pushed in congress was to increase the amount of funds provided by the government to a transition.[9] Since 1976, the government had provided $2 million to the president-elect's team and $1 million to the outgoing president's administration to fund a transition.[10]
Legislation named thePresidential Transitions Effectiveness Act was successfully passed in 1988.[7] In part, this legislation increases the amount given to presidential transitions to $3.5 million for the president-elect's team and $1.5 million to the outgoing president's administration.[7][10] It also required that private contributions to transitions and the names of transition personnel would be publicly disclosed.[7] It required, in return for receiving federal services and funding, transition teams would formally disclose the date, source, and amount of all privately contributed funds within 30 days after the inauguration.[7] The legislation also placed a cap of $5,000 on private contributions from any one person or organization to a transition team.[7] The bill also required transitions to disclose information about transition team members prior to initial contact with a federal department or agency.[7]
There had also been an unsuccessful effort to altogether stop president-elects from accepting private contributions to help fund their transitions, a bill for which was approved in theUnited States House of Representatives on March 31, 1988.[11][12]
Early discussions about a prospective presidential transition for Bush began in late 1987.[13] In January 1988, Bush privately selected Chase Untermeyer to lead the pre-election planning of his potential presidential transition.[3]
Six months before the election, in April 1988 (after Bush had become the Republican Party'spresumptive nominee), action for the planning for a potential Bush presidential transition began in earnest, being led, at this stage, by Untermeyer.[3][14][15][2] This planning effort maintained a low-key profile.[3]
At the same time, Reagan's staff took steps to prepare for a presidential transition.[2] This included having his director of President Personnel meet with Untermeyer for discussions, and having hisWhite House chief of staff,Kenneth Duberstein, prepare a checklist for the transition team of whichever candidate would win the election.[2]
In mid-October, Bush said that, if elected, he would be ready to quickly name hisCabinet picks.[16]
On November 9, Bush namedCraig L. Fuller andRobert Teeter as the heads of his transition team.[7][14] Fuller was hisVice presidential chief of staff, while Teeter had been his campaign's toppollster and senior strategist.[14] This would be indicative of the rest of the transition, where Bush largely relied on close advisors and political allies he had become acquainted with over his career to lead the effort.[3] Bush also named Chase Untermeyer as its personnel director, and pledged "major turnover" in order to "reinvigorate" the government.[14] He namedC. Boyden Gray, his longtime legal counsel, as the transition's legal advisor, andSheila Tate, who had been the campaign'spress secretary, as the press secretary of the transition.[14] These members Bush named at the start of his transition were largely young, in the 30s and 40s, had reputations as moderate-leaning Republicans, had years of experience inWashington, D.C. politics, and had (except for Tate) worked with Bush for several years.[7][14]
Untermeyer remained on the transition as a deputy.[2] Bush also namedJames Baker as an advisor on "key aspects" of the transition.[7] While Untermeyer's original recommendation was for the transition to have a small staff of roughly 100, the staff would grow to around 225 members.[2] Even still, this transition was much smaller than the previousReagan transition, which had accumulated a massive 1,000 to 1,500 volunteers and paid staff.[3][4] Bush had publicly expressed his desire to run, "a somewhat leaner transition organization than we had in 1980."[4]
The transition team received $3.5 million and the outgoing White House received $1.75 million in funding from the federal government.[17] The outgoing White House received $250,000 less than the normally would be given to a transition, due to the fact that the incumbent vice president (Bush) would not be transitioning out of government.[17]
In mid-November, Bush opened his transition office onDupont Circle in Washington, D.C.[7][4] The transition opted to use a private building at expense, rather than the alternative of having theGeneral Services Administration provide his team office space in a federal government property, which would have been free-of-charge to the transition.[17]
On November 22, 1988, Duberstein requested that both Cabinet members and agency heads provide information to the transition team pertaining to organizational matters, goals and functions, resource descriptions, congressional oversight committees, regulatory programs, and other important matters of relevance to each agency.[7]
By the end of November, the majority of executive branch agencies had already designated internal transition leaders to assist Bush's transition liaisons.[7] Because the transition did not have large teams for each agency, Duberstein sent a memo to agency political appointees urging them to prepare briefing brooks for incoming appointees.[2] In regard to White House aides, the transition suffered from a lack of communication between the outgoing aides and their counterparts in Bush's planned administration.[18]
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On December 7, Bush joined Reagan for theGovernors Island Summit withSoviet Uniongeneral secretaryMikhail Gorbachev.
Nine days before Bush's inauguration, his wifeBarbara received a tour of the White House from Reagan's wifeNancy. The two wives had a unfriendly relationship with one another, and it was reported that the tour that Nancy Reagan gave was rather curt.[19]
Reagan is credited with, during this transition, having begun a tradition of presidents leaving a handwritten note in the Oval Office for their successors.[20]
As many as about 5,000 jobs would be available for the incoming president to appoint new holders to.[4]
The day after the election, Bush named his first Cabinet secretary designee, designatingJames A. Baker as his choice forsecretary of state.[4] This was unusually early, at the time, for a president-elect to begin naming Cabinet designees, as the earliest any of the last several president-elects had begun doing so in their transitions was whenDwight D. Eisenhower did so 16 days after his election.[4]
Nine days after winning the election, Bush choseJohn H. Sununu to serve as his White House chief of staff.[2] Per media reports, in the days after the election, there had been tense disagreement among his staff about who should hold this position in Bush's administration. According to these reports, both Fuller and Teeter were opposed to the choice of Sununu, and this would be the reason that neither of them chose to join Bush's presidential administration after the transition.[2]
The transition was marred by confusion among incumbents holders of appointed offices as to whether they could expect to retain their positions into the Bush administration.[21] Reagan had asked his appointees to submit letters of resignation, to make way for Bush appointees.[1][22] Reagan requested that cabinet appointees and more than 500 other political appointees tender their resignations in time for Bush's presidency.[4] However, many appointees, wrongly presuming they would be retained in the "friendly takeover", did not do so.[1][22] Reagan's White House chief of staff, Kenneth Duberstein, would later recount having to have uncomfortable conversations with individuals to persuade them to tender their resignations.[1] While many Reagan appointees were expected to resign, it had been anticipated from the start of the transition that select recent Reagan appointees, who Bush had had input in hiring, would remain for the Bush administration.[8] Bush did keep a number of Reagan appointees. For instance, of his 53 White House staff hires, 27 had held a role in the Reagan administration.[23] Bush also had said shortly after the election that he would retain three Reagan Cabinet secretaries,treasury secretaryNicholas F. Brady,attorney generalRichard Thornburgh, andsecretary of educationLauro Cavazos.[23] Additionally, Bush selected many more Reagan high-ranking administration officials to different top positions than the ones that they had held under Reagan.[24]
Many of Bush's Cabinet selections were longtime associates with strong levels of prior government experience.[2] Bush's picks for his Cabinet were more ethnically diverse than those of the Cabinets previous Republican Party presidents, including two women, twohispanic Americans, and anAfrican-American.[23]
Some of Bush's Cabinet picks would attract controversy.[23] For instance, his pick forsecretary of health and human services,Louis Wade Sullivan, encountered some resistance from "pro-life"conservatives because of his previously stated stance onabortion. Sullivan had previously been quoted as saying that, while he opposed federal funding for abortion, he supported what he regarded to be a woman's right to elect for an abortion if she desires one.[25] Sullivan, once nominated, would say he would side with Bush's stance of opposing abortions in most instances.[26] Sullivan would ultimately express opposition to abortion during hisUnited States Senate confirmation process, and was confirmed.[23][27]John Tower, Bush's selection forsecretary of defense, would later attract tremendous controversy during his United States Senate confirmation process in the early days of Bush's presidency, ultimately becoming the first Cabinet nominee formally rejected in a U.S. Senate vote in 30 years, and the most recent one.[23][28][29]
In early March 1989, it was reported that many experts argued that Bush's transition, and the first two weeks of his presidency, had both been lackluster.[40]
Some have retrospectively characterized the transition as having been somewhat bumpy,[22] In March 2001,Stephen Hess of theBrookings Institution wrote that the transition had been "uneasy".[23]
Some have given the transition great praise. In 2020, academicBarbara A. Perry gave it as an example of a "good" presidential transition.[41] In 2000, journalist Jonathan Weisman ofThe Baltimore Sun called it "among the best transition teams".[42]
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