Clinton's Chief Of Staff, Leon Panetta, To Run CIA

January 5, 2009 6:33 p.m. EST

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - Leon Panetta, a former California congressman and Chief of Staff to former President Bill Clinton, has been named to head the Central Intelligence Agency.

An unnamed Democratic official on Monday identified Panetta as the choice of incoming president Barack Obama.

Panetta served in the Army and was California's Democratic representative from 1977 to 1993. He chaired the House Committee on the Budget from 1989 to 1993 and was director of the Office of Management and Budget under the Clinton administration.

He was member of the Iraq Study Group that made recommendations on the Iraq War in 2006.

Panetta and his wife Sylvia currently direct the Leon & Sylvia Panetta Institute for Public Policy at California State University in Monterey Bay.