President Barack Obama will name former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles and former Wyoming Republican Sen. Alan Simpson as co-chairmen of a bipartisan commission to tackle the mounting federal debt, an administration official said Tuesday.
Separately, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said the president will sign an executive order creating the commission this week.
Republican leaders still have not decided whether they will participate in the commission, which the White House has touted as a tool to cut the debt and U.S. federal deficit.