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Floor Services Chief is the title of the staff member in the speaker's or majority leader's office who runs the majority cloakroom in the
United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Artic ...
.Andie Coller, ''25 people you should know on the Hill'', Politico, January 6, 2009
Bridget Johnson, ''Tonight's State of the Union schedule'', The Hill - Blog Briefing Room, January 27, 2010
/ref> The current floor services chief for the Republican Cloakroom is Timothy J. Harroun, appointed by Republican Speaker
John Boehner John Andrew Boehner ( ; born , 1949) is an American politician who served as the 53rd speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 2011 to 2015. A member of the Republican Party, he served 13 terms as the U.S. representative ...
. The Democratic floor chief is Barry K. Sullivan, who was appointed by Democratic Speaker
Nancy Pelosi Nancy Patricia Pelosi ( ; ; born March 26, 1940) is an American politician who was the List of Speakers of the United States House of Representatives, 52nd speaker of the United States House of Representatives, serving from 2007 to 2011 an ...
.Mike Allen, Mike Allen's Playbook, January 27, 2010
/ref> Sullivan's predecessor was Donald Anderson, who was appointed by Speaker Thomas P O'Neill. When Harroun is floor services chief, Sullivan is minority cloakroom manager. Similarly, when Sullivan was floor services chief, Harroun was minority cloakroom manager. The position is informally known as the "cloakroom manager", as it has traditionally included responsibility for overseeing the operations of the majority party's cloakroom, such as the snack bar,
/ref>[http://oralhistory.clerk.house.gov/interviewee.html?name=anderson-donn&view=media#anderson-whip_call House Clerk, ''Oral History of the U.S. House of Representatives - Donnald K. Anderson Audio and Video'', 2006] telephones,House Clerk, ''Oral History of the U.S. House of Representatives - Glenn Rupp Interview 2 - April 28, 2005'', 2005
/ref> and clothing storage.


Added responsibilities, 2007–2010

From the 2007 State of the Union Address through the 2010 State of the Union Address (i.e. the 110th and 111th Congresses), the floor services chief announced the entry of the: *
vice president A vice president or vice-president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vi ...
and
Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
*
dean of the diplomatic corps The diplomatic corps () is the collective body of foreign diplomats accredited to a particular country or body. The diplomatic corps may, in certain contexts, refer to the collection of accredited heads of mission (ambassadors, high commissi ...
(or acting dean) *
chief justice of the United States The chief justice of the United States is the chief judge of the Supreme Court of the United States and is the highest-ranking officer of the U.S. federal judiciary. Appointments Clause, Article II, Section 2, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution g ...
and the
associate justice An associate justice or associate judge (or simply associate) is a judicial panel member who is not the chief justice in some jurisdictions. The title "Associate Justice" is used for members of the Supreme Court of the United States and some ...
s *the Cabinet at each
joint session of Congress A joint session of the United States Congress is a gathering of members of the two chambers of the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States: the Senate and the House of Representatives. Joint sessions can be held on ...
that the president addressed (i.e., excluding the joint session for the counting of electoral votes).''S. Boston native gets the call'', Boston Globe, January 24, 2007
/ref>Congressional Record, January 27, 2010, H415
/ref>See transcript a
C-SPAN, Electoral Vote Count Certification
/ref> When the president spoke at a joint session, the floor services chief and the House sergeant at arms together announced his presence, with the floor services chief loudly stating the phrase: "Madame Speaker" (this responsibility existed only under Speaker
Nancy Pelosi Nancy Patricia Pelosi ( ; ; born March 26, 1940) is an American politician who was the List of Speakers of the United States House of Representatives, 52nd speaker of the United States House of Representatives, serving from 2007 to 2011 an ...
), to which the sergeant at arms rejoined: "The President of the United States." (The announcement of the president has been solely the role of the House Sergeant at Arms since 2011, as it was before 2007, when Floor Services Chief Barry K. Sullivan was accorded the responsibility of uttering the first part by Speaker Pelosi.) During the six joint meetings of Congress (bicameral gatherings at which the president did not speak, but at which a foreign
head of state A head of state is the public persona of a sovereign state.#Foakes, Foakes, pp. 110–11 "
he head of state He or HE may refer to: Language * He (letter), the fifth letter of the Semitic abjads * He (pronoun), a pronoun in Modern English * He (kana), one of the Japanese kana (へ in hiragana and ヘ in katakana) * Ge (Cyrillic), a Cyrillic letter cal ...
being an embodiment of the State itself or representative of its international persona." The name given to the office of head of sta ...
or
head of government In the Executive (government), executive branch, the head of government is the highest or the second-highest official of a sovereign state, a federated state, or a self-governing colony, autonomous region, or other government who often presid ...
did) in the 110th and 111th Congresses, the floor services chief likewise announced all of the other persons listed above.See Transcript a
C-SPAN, ''German Chancellor Address to Joint Meeting of Congress''
/ref> Then, unlike in a joint session, the floor services chief alone performed the complete announcement of the foreign head of government, while the House sergeant at arms simply physically escorted the visiting dignitary to the speaker's rostrum.


References

{{USCongress Employees of the United States House of Representatives