As the third year of the Clinton administration draws to a close, one of the long-standing bits of unfinished business at the Department of Transportation is finally being addressed. In August, the White House announced that it would nominate a Washington-based attorney, Charles Hunnicutt, to the position of assistant secretary for international policy affairs. As holder of this long vacant post Hunnicutt would be responsible for overseeing international aviation issues.
The last person to hold the job in an official capacity was Jeffrey Shane during the Bush administration. Since then, Patrick Murphy, the civil servant at deputy assistant level, has been working as the acting assistant secretary.
In late July, Murphy was moved back to his formal, non-political position of deputy assistant secretary while the holder of that post, political appointee Mark Gerchick, began working as acting assistant secretary.
This round of musical chairs seems to have been sparked off by the departure of general counsel Steve Kaplan, who came to DOT from Denver with secretary Federico Peña, and recently returned there. Kaplan had been a trusted advisor to Peña, and, because of the absence of a political appointee, spent much of his time on international aviation issues, pushing policies in a way that Murphy could not. It was Kaplan, for example, who in large part engineered the open skies liberalisation between the US and Canada in the past year, an important event that probably could not have happened without someone directly representing Peña and the White House.
Though many had assumed that Gerchick would take over as assistant secretary, either he or the administration was unwilling to have him subjected to the prerequisite Senate confirmation hearings.
Hunnicutt, a seasoned trade lawyer with no experience in the field of international aviation, may be a safe confirmation bet but once he gets on the job he will have no more than a year to become familiar with the issues and establish rapport and influence in Peña's department.
By this time next year, presidential campaign politics will be in top gear, and Peña's tenure as secretary may draw to a close, either at his own behest - he's stayed in the post longer than many other secretaries - or as a new administration is ushered in and cleans house.
These recent personnel events may have little impact on aviation policy: Murphy is acting in an advisory capacity to Peña, and Gerchick, who came from the FAA earlier this year, has been increasingly involved in international policy matters.
But the real question is, can Hunnicutt actually make a mark for himself in a job that, most people agree, should have been filled in the first months of 1993? Long-time aviation officials in Washington don't know the answer, simply because they do not know Hunnicutt.
The other thing observers have difficulty figuring out is why anyone would seek a political appointment so late in the administration. The answer may be more simple than one would expect, says a Washington aviation lawyer: 'Even just being appointed assistant secretary looks great on your resume.'
Source: Airline Business
