The Hill News

As we head into the heart of the presidential campaign, a tired political narrative threatens to reawake. It has been tradition that candidates who plan for an electoral victory too early are accused of being presumptuous, arrogant, and disrespectful to voters and the electoral process. President George H.W. Bush accused then candidate Bill Clinton of “measuring the drapes” of the White House long before Election Day and others have been criticized for “counting chickens before they hatch.” As was the case in 1992, these rhetorical barbs are often ineffective and failed to get President Bush re-elected, but this type of accusation and the media attention that it generates pose more serious long-term risks.

The risks are two-fold. First, if thorough planning does not commence early, the new president may not be prepared to make the plethora of policy, organizational, and personnel decisions. President George W. Bush began his planning in late 1999, enabling a! smooth transition, despite the truncated timeframe necessitated by the vote recount. President Obama officially began his transition in May of 2008 when he announced Chris Lu would begin planning. The thorough vetting of thousands of individuals for hundreds of positions in government simply cannot occur in just two months. Furthermore, in an increasingly fragile and security conscious time in our nation’s history, a seamless transition in national security is critical. Congress has helped facilitate this by permitting the early security screening by the FBI of selected individuals from each major campaign. Candidate Obama had nearly 100 advisors pre-screened, but Senator John McCain requested early security screening of just a handful of advisors, risking a gap in the transfer of sensitive information had he won. This is a risk not worth taking ever again.

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