MICHELE NORRIS, host:
This is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED from NPR News. I'm Michele Norris.
A voice you've heard often from the White House is going silent - well, not really. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs is leaving. He announced today he will become a private sector consultant to the Obama re-election campaign, and he will appear in the media as a surrogate for the president.
As NPR's Mara Liasson reports, Gibbs isn't the first to leave, and he won't be the last.
MARA LIASSON: The long-anticipated White House shakeup has begun. Here's Robert Gibbs at his familiar perch in the briefing room today, describing the honor and privilege of the job he's about to give up.
Mr. ROBERT GIBBS (Press Secretary, White House): I have enjoyed every time I've come out here, even on days when you wake up at four and pick up the paper and groan that you have the sense of what the first several questions might be.
LIASSON: With hours like that and no real vacation since he signed on with then-Senator Obama seven years ago, Gibbs is understandably fried.
Mr. ARI FLEISCHER (Former Press Secretary, White House): The White House press secretary job is the most wonderful job in the world, and it's the most burnout job in the world.
LIASSON: That's Ari Fleischer who had Gibbs' job in the Bush White House. Fleischer, like Gibbs, had a sometimes contentious relationship with the press corps. He says the public gets a distorted view of the press secretary from those daily sparring sessions on television.
Mr. FLEISCHER: The briefing room is such a misrepresentation of what the press secretary does. It's a TV show these days. It's not a real briefing anymore. The real work of the press secretary is done behind the scenes, 20 times a day when reporters walk into the press secretary's office, close the door and there's a private conversation between the press secretary and a reporter. That's how the job really gets done.
LIASSON: And that's where Gibbs had the credibility to communicate the president's thinking that came from both unlimited access and a close relationship with Mr. Obama.
Gibbs' replacement will be announced in a few weeks, but the administration has already made some other changes. Next week, Obama's campaign strategist David Plouffe arrives, taking over from David Axelrod who's moving back to Chicago to run the re-election campaign. Plouffe is an old hand, but Gibbs says he counts as fresh blood.
Mr. GIBBS: You have to admit there's a bubble in here to some degree. So I think having new voices and having fresh voices, some of those voices that are coming back from having taken a couple of years off, are an important part of this process.
LIASSON: It's a process Gibbs describes as a major retooling. Soon, there will be a new permanent chief of staff - maybe former Clinton Commerce Secretary William Daley, who is at the White House meeting with the president today. And on Friday, the White House is set to announce several new economic staff appointments.
Mara Liasson, NPR News, the White House.