President Barack Obama announced a reshuffling of his top White House personnel Friday, naming Deputy National Security Adviser Denis McDonough as his new chief of staff and saying goodbye to longtime senior adviser David Plouffe, a key architect of his political strategy.
Obama promoted McDonough, one of his most trusted and loyal deputies, to oversee White House operations as the administration tackles the major legislative initiatives of his second term, including gun-control measures, immigration reform and tax and budgetary issues.
McDonough, 43, replaced Jack Lew, whom Obama has nominated to run the Treasury Department. White House officials said Tony Blinken, a national security adviser to Vice President Joe Biden, would replace McDonough as the second-most-senior official on the National Security Council.