For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
September 17, 2001

President Bush to Nominate One Individual to Serve in his Administration and Appoint Three Individuals to Serve in his Administration

President George W. Bush today announced his intention to nominate one individual and announced his intention to appoint three individuals to serve as members of his administration.

The President intends to nominate Michelle Van Cleave to be Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict. Van Cleave is presently the President of National Security Concepts, a firm specializing in strategic planning and senior level policy analysis for government customers. During the 105th Congress, she was the staff director and chief counsel of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Technology, Terrorism and Government Information, and from 1993 to 1997, Ms. Van Cleave was Of Counsel to the law firm of Feith and Zell. From 1987 to 1993, she was the General Counsel and Assistant Director for National Security Affairs in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Van Cleave also served as assistant for defense and foreign policy to Congressman Jack Kemp. She received her undergraduate, Master’s and Law degrees from the University of Southern California.

The President intends to appoint the following three individuals to serve as Members of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom for a term of two years expiring on May 14, 2003.

Dr. Richard D. Land is currently the President and the Chief Executive Officer of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention in Nashville, Tennessee. Prior to joining the Southern Baptist Convention, Dr. Land was the Vice President for Academic Affairs at The Criswell College in Dallas, Texas. Land received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University, he received a Doctor of Philosophy from Oxford University in Oxford, England, and he received a Master’s of Theology from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.

The Most Reverend William Francis Murphy is presently Bishop of the Archdiocese of Rockville Centre, New York. Bishop Murphy was the Vicar General and Moderator of the Curia for the Archdiocese of Boston. Murphy served as the Director of the Office of Social Justice and the Secretary of Community Relations for the Archdiocese of Boston from 1987 to 1993, and from 1980 to 1987, he was the Under Secretary of the Pontifical Commission Justitia et Pax. He is a graduate of St. John’s Seminary and the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome.

Shirin Raziuddin Tahir-Kheli is the Director of the South Asia Program at the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University and is also a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia. From 1992 to 1993, she was a member of the National Advisory Council on the Public Service, and from 1990 to 1993, she was the Alternate U.S. Representative for Special Political Affairs to the United Nations. From 1984 to 1989, Tahir-Kheli was a member of the National Security Council, first as the Director of Political-Military Affairs and then as Director of Near East and South Asian Affairs. She is a graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University, and she received a Master’s degree and Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania.

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