Deaver, Meese Won’t Be Replaced; Baker Gets Their Duties
President Reagan views two departing top California aides--Michael Deaver and Edwin Meese--as irreplaceable and their functions will be transferred to the office of chief of staff James Baker, a White House spokesman said today.
Deputy press secretary Marlin Fitzwater told reporters that Deaver, the deputy chief of the White House staff whose resignation was announced Thursday, and Meese, the White House counselor whose nomination as attorney general has been resubmitted to the Senate, both had a “unique” relationship with Reagan.
The two developments raised new questions about policy-making in the second Reagan term, a topic that gained new currency just two days earlier with the disclosure that Interior Secretary William Clark, another member of the inner circle that accompanied Reagan to Washington in 1981, soon will head back West.
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