Congressional Research Service

Presidential Appointments to Full-time Positions in Independent and Other Agencies During the 112th Congress Congressional Research Service

Publisher Marketing: The President makes appointments to positions within the federal government, either using the authorities granted to the President alone or with the advice and consent of the Senate. This report identifies all nominations that were submitted to the Senate for full-time positions in 40 organizations in the executive branch (27 independent agencies, 6 agencies in the Executive Office of the President [EOP], and 7 multilateral organizations) and 4 agencies in the legislative branch. It excludes appointments to executive departments and to regulatory and other boards and commissions, which are covered in other reports. Information for each agency is presented in tables. The tables include full-time positions confirmed by the Senate, pay levels for these positions, and appointment action within each independent agency. Additional summary information across all agencies covered in the report appears in the appendix. During the 112th Congress, the President submitted 34 nominations to the Senate for full-time positions in independent agencies, agencies in the EOP, multilateral agencies, and legislative branch agencies. Of these 34 nominations, 27 were confirmed, 1 was withdrawn, and 6 were returned to him in accordance with Senate rules. For those nominations that were confirmed, a mean (average) of 142.7 days elapsed between nomination and confirmation. The median number of days elapsed was 112.0. The President made one recess appointment to a full-time position in an independent agency during the 112th Congress. Information for this report was compiled using the Senate nominations database of the Legislative Information System (LIS) at http: //www.lis.gov/nomis/, the Congressional Record (daily edition), the Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, telephone discussions with agency officials, agency websites, the United States Code, and the 2012 Plum Book (United States Government Policy and Supporting Positions).