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                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 29, 1993                   TAG: 9301290016
SECTION: NATL/INTL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The Washington Post
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

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WHOA, BUSH AIDE GETS JOB WITH CLINTON

The Clinton administration has confirmed that Patty Presock, former President George Bush's private secretary who handled much of his personal and family business from her post outside the Oval Office, is being kept on in the Clinton White House - complete with her West Wing parking spot and her $115,300 salary, one of the highest Bush staff salaries.

Officials would not say precisely what Presock is doing, or why someone so closely associated with the former president will stay on the new president's payroll. Presock, with 23 years in the executive branch, is not a typical career employee. She had been with Bush since his first run for the presidency in 1980 and worked in the private residence after she tired of traffic outside the Oval Office.

When Bush's longtime aides accompanied him on a farewell drop-off trip to Houston, several asked for Presock and were told that she was too upset by the loss to make the trip.

Word of Presock's employment raised eyebrows in GOP circles this week, especially among aides who expressed shock that Presock would serve a president who defeated Bush.

"I couldn't have been any more surprised than if Barbara Bush had taken a job," a former Bush aide said.

Then again, maybe it's not so strange. Presock discovered, in the midst of the campaign, that Bush's diaries contained Iran-Contra matters and told Bush, who insisted they had no relevance. She insisted they did and forced a further review that led to their eventual disclosure - a month after the election, according to report by Bush's lawyer, former attorney general Griffin Bell.

Presock did not return phone calls.

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