Baker’s White House Move Imminent, Officials Say

With the Republican National Convention nearly upon him and his White House still struggling to shift into campaign gear, President Bush is about to move Secretary of State James A. Baker III into a senior White House position, giving him authority over that operation and the reelection campaign, White House and campaign officials said Wednesday.

“It looks as if they’ll make some sort of announcement” today, one source close to the White House and the Bush campaign said Wednesday. Baker, a longtime friend and political confidant of the President, was likely to be named a senior adviser or counselor on the White House staff or, possibly, chief of staff, sources said.

However, Baker’s expressed reluctance to abandon his diplomatic post, and Bush’s fondness for surprise announcements, particularly in the personnel realm, made the move and its timing a bit less than certain. Deputy White House press secretary Laura Melillo said accounts of a Baker move were “pure speculation.”

Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence S. Eagleburger was expected to take over from Baker at the State Department. He could be named acting secretary of state, a position that would not require Senate confirmation, or he could be nominated as the secretary, requiring Senate action.

The move parallels one Baker made four years ago when he gave up his position as Treasury secretary in the closing months of the Ronald Reagan Administration to take over Bush’s election drive, which was struggling to overcome a lack of powerful control at the top.

Bush and Baker met at the White House Wednesday afternoon in what was described as one of their regular conferences--although the focus of the session was not necessarily routine, a White House official said.

If the new position works as envisioned, Baker--whose national political experience dates to his job running President Gerald R. Ford’s unsuccessful election campaign in 1976--would begin next week to coordinate the frenetic work of the Bush campaign and the White House in the final 11 weeks before Election Day.

Regardless of his title, Baker would be second only to the President in each organization, directing the work of both campaign Chairman Robert M. Teeter and Samuel K. Skinner, the White House chief of staff whose job Baker once held during Reagan’s first term.

Baker’s departure from the State Department will not be without a price. With the Middle East peace negotiations engineered by Baker and Bush over the past year about to resume in Washington a week from Monday, experts expressed fear that the talks will slow down, if not stumble, without Baker’s mediating role, backed up by his authority to speak for Bush.

“I think it does raise some risk that the fledgling peace process will remain just that, rather than taking to wing,” said William B. Quandt, a senior fellow in foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution and a specialist in Middle East issues on the staff of the National Security Council during the Jimmy Carter Administration.

“It’s not a disaster, but it’s unfortunate for the peace process.”

Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, speaking at the National Press Club in Washington, said he did not know what Baker would do. But, the prime minister said, regardless of Baker’s role, “we will continue with the peace negotiations with the Jordanian-Palestinian delegation, with the Syrian delegation and the Lebanese. Hopefully, hopefully, it will not be interfered by personnel changes.”