Shalanda Young’s unique skill for negotiating budgets is one of the few things Democrats and Republicans can agree on.
The longtime staffer turned director of the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has a reputation for being able to talk to members across the aisle. She was largely credited in May for the deal President Biden and then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) reached to raise the debt ceiling, a deal that ultimately became one of the reasons for McCarthy’s downfall.
Asked how she garners so much respect during these contentious political times, Young said Republicans aren’t the enemy.
“If you go into a room thinking you’re sitting across from your worst enemy, no one is going to come out of there with anything focusing on a deal,” she said.
She approaches negotiations knowing that both sides can’t get everything they want, but neither needs to compromise their values to find common ground. And while she worries about the current political climate, it also “reenergizes” her.
“I’m in the business of making sure government can function, and both parties are necessary to make that happen, and if I can pick up a phone and call people that other people can’t call, it is my duty as an American citizen who wants the best for our country to do that,” she said.
Young was the staff director for Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee before becoming the first Black woman to lead the OMB, and she said her unique background helps her in her current role.
“I think I’m different in a lot of ways. One, I’m just glad the president gave an old staffer the shot to run an agency,” she said. “He got a worker bee in me, and I speak the same language as the staff here … staffers’ brain and pace is just very different.”