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Press Release | January 22, 2023

Biden Risks Legacy by Choosing Zients as Chief of Staff

Ethics in GovernmentExecutive BranchJeff ZientsRevolving Door
Biden Risks Legacy by Choosing Zients as Chief of Staff

As a businessman, Jeffrey Zients embodied much of the corporate misconduct the executive branch ought to be cracking down on.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
 Jeff Hauser, hauser@therevolvingdoorproject.org and (202) 957-9719

In response to the Washington Post report that “President Biden will name Jeff Zients to serve as his next chief of staff,” Revolving Door Project Executive Director Jeff Hauser issued the following statement:

“The Biden Administration has been at its best when it has been on the attack against corporate excesses that wide majorities of Americans find abhorrent.” 

“Americans are appalled by profiteering in healthcare – Jeff Zients has become astonishingly rich by profiteering in healthcare.” 

“Americans are aghast at how social media companies have built monopolies and violated privacy laws – Zients served on the Board of Directors of Facebook as it was defending itself against growing attacks from both political parties.”

“And as Daniel Boguslaw and Max Moran of the Revolving Door Project wrote in The American Prospect last April, ‘Over the span of two decades, the health care companies that Zients controlled, invested in, and helped oversee were forced to pay tens of millions of dollars to settle allegations of Medicare and Medicaid fraud.'”

“Joe Biden’s best chance to fight for the American people and defeat the dark forces threatening our economy is to show real results via the branch of government he runs – the executive branch. We have long argued for a ‘corporate crackdown‘ on behaviors that violate federal laws and harm the American people in order for corporations to become richer. Those are the practices that have made Zients rich. We’re deeply worried that Zients will prevent the administration from exercising power righteously on behalf of an already cynical populace.”

“Hopefully Zients will prove us wrong – but unless that unlikely and fortuitous surprise occurs, Biden will need a quick hook.”

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For more resources:

** Corporate Crackdown Agenda

** The Corporate Past Of Jeffrey Zients

** The New York Times in 2020: “In a sign of the pushback to come, the Revolving Door Project, which has been urging Mr. Biden to keep corporate influence out of his administration, has compiled a 13-page document about Mr. Zients. The file highlights his wealth, his appetite for deficit reduction during the Obama years and his recent work as chief executive of Cranemere. In the Obama administration, ‘his role was essentially to be a management consultant for the executive branch: cutting costs, finding efficiencies and looking at things like a businessman,’ the Revolving Door document says. The group points to the majority stake that Cranemere took in NorthStar Anesthesia, a company that provides anesthesia services to hospitals and medical offices, in 2018. It cites negative reviews that NorthStar Anesthesia received through the Better Business Bureau, including allegations of surprise billing and a threat to send a dental patient’s bill to a collection agency during a dispute over insurance coverage. That matter was resolved, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.”

PHOTO CREDIT: “Jeffrey Zients” by Center for American Progress is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0.

Ethics in GovernmentExecutive BranchJeff ZientsRevolving Door

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