Banking Lawyer Is Clinton Pick for NCUA Board

a Democrat, to the board of the National Credit Union Administration, the White House announced Monday. Pending confirmation by the Senate, Ms. Wheat, 34, would replace NCUA director Robert Swan on the agency's three-member board. Ms. Wheat's nominating papers went to the Senate Banking Committee on Nov. 9. The White House hopes to hurry her nomination through the Senate, so it can't get tripped up by partisan squabbling during the presidential campaign season next year, sources said. Ms. Wheat, who lives in the Washington suburb of Silver Spring, Md., declined comment until she was confirmed. The nominee is the wife of former Rep. Alan Wheat, who represented Missouri from 1982 to 1994, when he lost a senatorial race to John Ashcroft. Ms. Wheat, a lawyer who has specialized in banking and corporate law, was backed by trade groups in California and Missouri that are affiliated with the Credit Union National Association. "Ms. Wheat has a distinguished background and appears very capable," said Charles O. Zuver, CUNA's director of governmental affairs, in a statement. "We look forward to working with her."