Commissioner Gail Heriot is seeking a special assistant/counsel, who will be a Schedule C political appointee. The Commission is an independent, bipartisan federal agency that advises Congress, the President, and the American people on civil rights (anti-discrimination) matters. Commissioner Heriot is one of its eight members and was appointed to the Commission on the recommendation of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. More information about the Commission and its publications can be found on its website, https://www.usccr.gov/. All Commissioners are part time employees who travel to Washington about once a month for business meetings and work remotely from their homes or offices the rest of the time. All special assistants/counsel are full-time employees who work out of the Commission’s headquarters office in Washington, D.C.
Special assistant duties include helping Commissioner Heriot with background research, editing, and drafting of Commissioner statements (essays published in Commission reports), letters, congressional testimony, and public service announcements; investigating potential topics for the Commission to study; identifying potential witnesses for Commission briefings; identifying potential members for the Commission’s state advisory committees; reviewing applications for State Advisory Committee membership and making recommendations to Commissioner Heriot about how to vote on proposed State Advisory Committee slates. Because the special assistant is based in the Washington, D.C. office and Commissioner Heriot lives and works in San Diego, California, the special assistant serves as the Commissioner’s “eyes and ears” in the Washington office and helps to communicate Commissioner Heriot’s positions to the Staff Director and other Washington-based staff.
The ideal candidate is a lawyer with 1-5 years experience, although candidates with slightly different backgrounds but other offsetting strengths will be considered. The special assistant needs to be philosophically and intellectually well-aligned with Commissioner Heriot on major civil rights issues. Although there is no ideological litmus test or party affiliation requirement, a successful candidate is likely to be conservative, libertarian, or some mix of both. The special assistant must be willing, once the COVID social distancing guidelines are lifted, to work out of the Commission’s Washington, D.C. headquarters office full time.
Recently, President Trump announced his intent to appoint Stephen Gilchrist of South Carolina to the Commission. There is one other vacancy on the Commission that President Trump may fill at any time. Each of those Commissioners will have the opportunity to hire one special assistant/counsel. Although every special assistant/commissioner pair has a unique relationship and strategy for handling workload, the job duties for those special assistants are likely to be very similar to those for the Heriot position. Commissioner Heriot would also like to collect resumes for those positions.
Special assistants are paid according to the federal GS scale; the special assistant will start somewhere between GS-11 and GS-14, depending on education and past experience.
Please send resumes and cover letters to gheriot@usccr.gov to apply, with cc’s to Alison Somin at aschmauch@usccr.gov and alison.somin@gmail.com (Commissioner Heriot’s departing special assistant/counsel) and Carissa Mulder at cmulder@usccr.gov (counsel to another appointed-by-Republican Commissioner, who may assist Commissioner Heriot with searching that takes place after Ms. Somin leaves.) Please address cover letters to Commissioner Gail Heriot, 1331 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Suite 1150, Washington, DC, 20425.