Jacob Joseph "Jack" Lew (born August 29, 1955) is the 25th and current White House Chief of Staff. Previously, he was the Director of the Office of Management and Budget from 1998 to 2001 and from 2010 to 2012.

Lew was born in New York City. He attended New York City public schools, graduating from Forest Hills High School. His father was a lawyer and rare-book dealer who came to the United States from Poland as a child. Lew attended Carleton College in Minnesota where his faculty adviser was Paul Wellstone, who eventually represented Minnesota in the U.S. Senate. He graduated from Harvard College in 1978 and the Georgetown University Law Center in 1983.

He worked as an aide to Rep. Joe Moakley (D-Mass.) from 1974 to 1975. He then was a senior policy adviser to House Speaker Tip O'Neill. Under O'Neill he served at the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee as Assistant Director and then Executive Director, and was responsible for work on domestic and economic issues including Social Security, Medicare, budget, tax, trade, appropriations, and energy issues.

Jacob ( /ˈdʒeɪkəb/; Hebrew: יַעֲקֹב‎‎ Standard Yaʿakov, Tiberian  Yaʿăqōḇ (help·info); Septuagint Greek: Ἰακώβ Iakōb; Arabic: يَعْقُوب‎ Yaʿqūb; "heel" or "leg-puller"), also later known as Israel (Hebrew: יִשְׂרָאֵל‎‎, Standard Yisraʾel, Tiberian Yiśrāʾēl; Septuagint Greek: Ἰσραήλ Israēl; Arabic: إِسْرَائِيل‎ Isrāʾīl; "persevere with God"), as described in the Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, the New Testament and the Qur'an was the third patriarch of the Hebrew people with whom God made a covenant, and ancestor of the tribes of Israel, which were named after his descendants.

In the Hebrew Bible, he is the son of Isaac and Rebekah, the grandson of Abraham and Sarah and of Bethuel, and the younger twin brother of Esau. Jacob had twelve sons and at least one daughter, by his two wives, Leah and Rachel, and by their female slaves Bilhah and Zilpah. The children named in Genesis were Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, daughter Dinah, Joseph, and Benjamin.

Before the birth of Benjamin, Jacob is renamed "Israel" by an angel (Genesis 32:28-29 and 35:10). The name "Israel" can be translated as "God contended", but other meanings have also been suggested. Some commentators say the name comes from the verb śœarar ("to rule, be strong, have authority over"), thereby making the name mean "God rules" or "God judges". Other possible meanings include "the prince of God" (from the King James Version) or "El fights/struggles".

Charles Timothy "Chuck" Hagel (born October 4, 1946) is a former United States Senator from Nebraska. A member of the Republican Party, he was first elected in 1996 and was reelected in 2002. In 2009, he was elected as Chairman of the Atlantic Council.

Born in North Platte, Nebraska, to Betty Dunn Hagel and Charles Dean Hagel, who had German and Polish ancestry, he graduated from St. Bonaventure High School (now Scotus Central Catholic High School) in Columbus, Nebraska, the Brown Institute for Radio and Television in 1966 and the University of Nebraska at Omaha in 1971. Hagel is a Vietnam War veteran, having served in the United States Army infantry, attaining the rank of Sergeant (E-5) from 1967 – 1968. He served as an infantry squad leader in the 9th Infantry Division. While serving during the Vietnam War, Hagel received the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry, two Purple Hearts, Army Commendation Medal, and the Combat Infantryman Badge.^{[citation needed]} After returning from Vietnam, he worked as a bartender and radio newscaster while finishing college.

Frank Raleigh Lautenberg (/ˈlɔːtənbɜrɡ/; born January 23, 1924) is the senior United States Senator from New Jersey and a member of the Democratic Party. He first served in the United States Senate from 1982 to 2001; after a brief retirement, he was re-elected to the Senate and has served since 2003. At age 88, Lautenberg is the oldest current senator. Before entering politics, he was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Automatic Data Processing, Inc.

Lautenberg was born in Paterson, New Jersey, to Sam and Mollie Lautenberg, impoverished Jewish immigrants from Poland and Russia who had arrived in the United States as infants. When Lautenberg was 19, his father, Sam, who worked in silk mills, sold coal, farmed and once ran a tavern, died of cancer. Frank Lautenberg had no formal Jewish education as a child; the family could not afford to join a synagogue and did not live very long in any single place.

Lautenberg served overseas in the United States Army Signal Corps in World War II after graduating from Nutley High School. Then, financed by the GI Bill, he attended and graduated from Columbia Business School in 1949 with a degree in economics. He was the first salesman at successful Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (ADP) and was its chairman and CEO. He was the executive commissioner of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey from 1978 to 1982.

Robert Upshur "Bob" Woodward (born March 26, 1943) is an American investigative journalist and non-fiction author. He has worked for The Washington Post since 1971 as a reporter, and is currently an associate editor of the Post.

While a young reporter for The Washington Post in 1972, Woodward was teamed up with Carl Bernstein; the two did much of the original news reporting on the Watergate scandal. These scandals led to numerous government investigations and the eventual resignation of President Richard Nixon. Gene Roberts, the former executive editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer and former managing editor of The New York Times, has called the work of Woodward and Bernstein "maybe the single greatest reporting effort of all time."

Woodward continued to work for The Washington Post after his reporting on Watergate. He has since written over a dozen books on American politics, most of which have topped bestsellers lists.

Woodward was born to Jane (née Upshur) and Alfred Woodward in Geneva, Illinois. He was a resident of Wheaton, Illinois. He enrolled in Yale University with an NROTC scholarship, and studied history and English literature. While at Yale, Woodward joined the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity. He received his B.A. degree in 1965, and began a five-year tour of duty in the U.S. Navy. After being discharged as a lieutenant in August, 1970, Woodward considered attending law school but applied for a job as a reporter for The Washington Post, while taking graduate courses at The George Washington University. Harry M. Rosenfeld, the Post's metropolitan editor, gave him a two-week trial but did not hire him because of his lack of journalistic experience. After a year at the Montgomery Sentinel, a weekly newspaper in the Washington, D.C. suburbs, Woodward was hired as a Post reporter in September, 1971.^{[citation needed]}