Ron Klain will reportedly be heading back to the private sector. “With the Ebola crisis seemingly in hand, Ron Klain, the veteran political operative the White House plucked from a venture capital gig to coordinate the government’s response, is planning a late-winter return to the private sector,” reports Fortune.
Klain has committed to former AOL chief Steve Case that by March 1, he’ll be back on the job as president of Case Holdings and general counsel for Case’s venture firm Revolution LLC, Case tells Fortune. An administration official confirmed the plan.
“He has no intention of staying on in any other capacity here at the White House,” the administration official said. “Ron will do the job for which he was appointed and return to Revolution.”
“He has no intention of staying on in any other capacity here at the White House,” the administration official said. “Ron will do the job for which he was appointed and return to Revolution.”
As Fortune points out, there was always speculation that Klain only accepted the Ebola czar job to better position himself for a better White House job. However, the business magazine suggests what others at the time of Klain’s appointment were not saying : that a short White House stay was always the plan.
Contrary to the chatter, Case said the expiration date on Klain’s public service has been well understood within the White House. Talks to bring Klain aboard proceeded rapidly — Case said they started two days before the White House announced the appointment on Oct. 17 — and that Klain “was not eager to take on this assignment but felt it was an important thing to do. He agreed to do it with the understanding that it would be for a limited period of time.”
