Susan Ross, the chief clerk for the powerful House Appropriations Committee, can still recall her response when Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) set a goal of passing all 12 of the party’s funding bills out of committee by August recess.
“I was like, that’s going to be really tight,” said Ross, who became staff director when Cole assumed the top spot on the panel in April.
“To their credit, all 12 of our cardinals and all 12 of the clerks, who are the people that work for each of those cardinals, really did put in just the great amount of effort to get that done and to make that schedule happen.”
Ross described her position as akin to that of a chief of staff, but “in a committee position.”
Her day-to-day schedule involves managing the committee’s professional staff, including the clerks for 12 subcommittees that craft the annual funding bills and their staff, as well as a front office team and press team.
“So, I basically manage those folks on a day-to-day basis, and, of course, work very closely with Chairman Cole and try to implement his vision for the committee and his vision for the legislative products that we’re putting forward.”
While Ross has only served in her current post for a few months, she is no stranger to the appropriations world. She previously served under Cole when he was chair of the subcommittee that assembles annual legislation funding the departments of Labor and Health and Human Services.
Ross said she arrived in Washington by way of the Presidential Management Intern Program, later known as the Presidential Management Fellows Program. That allowed Ross to work at the Education Department straight out of graduate school and gain experience working on Capitol Hill, where she “just loved the energy.”
“I loved the idea that every day when you came to work, you never exactly knew what issues or events might be happening. I loved the fast pace of it,” Ross said.
Ross said she next took a job with the House Education and the Workforce Committee, became a budget analyst and began interacting with the Appropriations Committee and the House Budget Committee.
The biggest lesson she learned working in Congress? The people’s work is “never done.”