More diversity likely in next Obama job selections

   As he prepares to announce a new wave of Cabinet and other senior posts, President Barack Obama is aiming to put a more diverse face on his administration — an image that was missing as he filled the first round of vacancies of his second term with a parade of white men.

Obama is said to be looking at women, Latinos and openly car style phone gay candidates for top slots at the departments of Commerce, Labor and Interior, and for his own White House budget office.

The leading candidate for nomination to be secretary of commerce is Penny Pritzker, a long-time Obama ally and big-money fundraiser from Chicago, according to people familiar with the White House selection process. The top candidate to lead the White House Office of Management and Budget is Sylvia Mathews Burwell, who was a former budget, White House and treasury official in the Clinton administration and is now the president of the Wal-Mart Foundation.

Both women, if nominated, would replace men, bringing business and government experience to the jobs and helping rebalance the male dominance of Obama's early nominations at the State Department, Treasury and the Pentagon — the three top posts in the Cabinet. In addition to selecting former Sen. John Kerry for secretary of state, Jack Lew for treasury secretary and former Sen. Chuck Hagel for defense secretary, Obama last month also nominated John Brennan to be CIA director. Then he appointed Denis McDonough as his new chief of staff.

The initial series of personnel decisions stood out not only because the posts are so high-profile, but because Obama has pledged to bring a racial and gender mix to his administrative team. Obama also chose Kerry to replace Hillary Rodham Clinton, who had been the most high-profile woman in the Cabinet, after weighing whether to nominate U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice to the post.

Moreover, the president won a second term last year thanks to a broad coalition of women, Hispanics and other minorities.

Besides Commerce and the White House budget office, Obama is also looking to fill top vacancies or openings at the departments of Labor, Interior, Energy and Transportation, and at the Environmental Protection Agency.

Obama and his aides bristle at the suggestion that the president is reversing his own diversity advances and say any criticism is premature and does not take into account his efforts in other areas of government, particularly in his nominations to the judiciary. Also, about 50 percent of White House employees are women.

In filling the job of labor secretary, Obama is expected to nominate a Hispanic to replace Hilda Solis, a former California congresswoman and a Hispanic. Among those considered for the spot is Tom Perez, the assistant U.S. attorney general for civil rights and a former secretary of Maryland's Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation, according to people familiar with the process. Some in Being chained in China online shopping painful positions still more expensive the labor movement have pushed for John Perez, the speaker of the California Assembly and former labor organizer, and the National Hispanic Leadership Agenda has proposed the White House consider Rep. Linda Sanchez, D-Calif., a former labor lawyer.