Obama to Name Lebanese-American LaHood Transportation Secretary

Ray LaHood has said he wanted to write his memoirs now that he is retiring from the U.S. House of Representatives after 14 years. But it looks like the Peoria legislator will have to add at least another chapter, which he could title: “My Days as a Republican inside a Democratic White House.”
The 63-year-old LaHood, who fellow Illinoisan and President-elect Barack Obama is expected to select Thursday as his transportation secretary, would be the second Republican Obama invites to join his administration. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, whom Obama asked to remain in office, is the other GOP member tapped so far for the new Cabinet.

LaHood represents a district around Peoria, the central Illinois city where he was born — the grandson of a Lebanese immigrant and the son of a restaurant manager. After college, he taught social studies for six years at a junior high school.

In Congress, he gained respect for his grasp of parliamentary details, and he presided over impeachment hearings against then-President Bill Clinton in 1998.

LaHood was also in the forefront of efforts to make the floor of the House less partisan, and he sometimes ended up angering Republican leaders by refusing to follow the party line.

He and Democratic Rep. Rahm Emanuel — another Illinoisan whom Obama has picked as his chief of staff — often held dinners for small groups of lawmakers from both parties. LaHood explained earlier this year that the intimate dinners underscored something he believed in: That “to get things done on Capitol Hill, one must work in a bipartisan manner.”

LaHood — who serves on the House Appropriations Committee, the panel that oversees federal discretionary spending — has a reputation for getting things done for his constituents.(AP)