White House

How Powerful Is Rahm Emanuel?

Chief of staff wields great influence.

Who exactly is running things in the White House? In a front-pager, The New York Times makes the case for the tremendous power of Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. According to the paper, "Seven months after moving into his office in the West Wing, Mr. Emanuel is emerging as perhaps the most influential White House chief of staff in a generation. But with his prominence in almost everything important going on in Washington comes a high degree of risk." Those risks may include being fired if Obama's grand policy efforts come up empty. But that won't happen without a fight, folks in Washington say: The man's a work horse. “It seems like he has a 72-hour day,” Senator Charles Schumer told the Times. That work includes involving himself in domestic and foreign policy, helping develop limits on credit-card policy and strategies for Pakistan.