Gordon To Lead Biden HHS Transition Team

By Susan J. Demas, Michigan Advance

Michigan Department of Health and Human Services Director Robert Gordon is one of the volunteer leads on President-elect Joe Biden’s Department of Health and Human Services transition team, the transition announced Tuesday.

Chiquita Brooks-LaSure of Manatt, Phelps and Phillips is the other team lead.

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer tapped Gordon in 2019 to lead the massive department, which has taken a lead role in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.

A Yale Law School graduate, Gordon worked for the Legal Aid Society of New York and New York public school system. He joined the President Barack Obama administration at the Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development.

He developed programs related to maternal and infant home visiting, teen pregnancy prevention and education investment. He also oversaw the Administration for Children and Families and the Administration on Aging at the Department of Health and Human Services.

“It was incredibly exciting to work in the Obama administration,” Gordon told the Advance in a May 2019 interview. “I was there from the beginning, working for a new, amazing, historic president. And also working at a time of deep crisis for the American economy … It was a very smart, committed group of people working at a difficult time, it was an honor,” Gordon said.

Several other Michiganders have places in the transition, including former U.S. Attorney Barb McQuade, who’s now a University of Michigan law professor. She is on the Department of Justice transition team.