Presidential transition of Barack Obama
President George W. Bush (left) and President-elect Barack Hussein Obama (right) meet in the Oval Office of the White House as part of the Presidential transition
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| Formation | November 2008 |
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| Type | Quasi-governmental–private |
| Purpose | Peaceful/Organized transfer of power |
| Headquarters | Washington, D.C. and Chicago |
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Budget
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$12 million |
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Staff
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450 |
| Website | http://change.gov/ |
The presidential transition of Barack Obama began when Barack Obama won the United States presidential election on November 4, 2008, and became the President-elect. He was formally elected by the Electoral College on December 15, 2008. The results were certified by a joint session of Congress on January 8, 2009, and the transition ended when he was inaugurated at noon on January 20, 2009.
The Obama transition organization was called the Obama-Biden Transition Project. The transition team was convened during the height of the campaign, well before the outcome could be known, to begin making preparations for a potential administration. It was co-chaired by John Podesta, who was Bill Clinton's fourth and last White House Chief of Staff and the president/chief executive officer of the Center for American Progress,Valerie Jarrett, who is one of Obama's longest-serving advisers, and Pete Rouse, former Senate chief of staff for Tom Daschle who succeeded Rahm Emanuel as Obama's chief of staff.
On November 5, the General Services Administration declared that Obama was the "apparent winner", making him eligible to receive transition funding and other government services, and granting him access to their 2008 Presidential Transition Headquarters in Washington, D.C. Podesta estimated that the transition would employ approximately 450 people and have a budget of about $12 million: $5.2 million would be paid by the federal government and the remaining $6.8 million would be funded by private sources, with each contribution limited to $5,000. The transition project would not accept money from political action committees or federal lobbyists.
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