WASHINGTON (9/10/14)--Jim Nussle, a former eight-term congressman and director of the White House Office of Management and Budget for President George W. Bush, is the new president/CEO of the Credit Union National Association, the chairman of the nation's largest trade group for credit unions announced Tuesday.

  Nussle will assume his new role for CUNA in Washington in the coming weeks.

"After an exhaustive search, in which nearly 100 highly qualified candidates were considered, the CUNA board has unanimously accepted and certified the executive search committee's recommendation of Jim as the next chief executive of our association," said CUNA Chairman Dennis Pierce Tuesday.

Nussle, 54, served in the U.S. House from 1991 to 2007 as a Republican representative for Iowa's 1st and 2nd Congressional Districts. From 2001-06, he served as chairman of the House Budget Committee, a key panel which oversees the federal budget process, including review of all bills and resolutions on the budget. The panel also monitors agencies and programs funded outside of the budgetary process.

Nussle, in a statement Tuesday, noted his long admiration for the advocacy strength of the credit union movement.

"I have witnessed first-hand the enthusiastic advocacy of the nation's nearly 7,000 credit unions and I look forward to working with them to ensure the credit union message and policy priorities are clearly understood in Washington and nationwide," he said.

"At a time when trustworthiness is at a premium, the individuals who make up the more than 100 million memberships at credit unions trust their credit unions to provide them, their families and their small businesses with the financial services they expect and need."

In 2007, Bush tapped Nussle as the 36th director of the Office of Management and Budget, the largest office within the Executive Office of the President of the United States (EOP). As OMB director, he was a member of the president's cabinet. He served through the conclusion of the Bush administration in 2009.

A member of the founding board of Growth Energy, a trade association of renewable energy companies and industry partners, he was named president/COO of the group in November 2010. He is the founder of The Nussle Group, a multidisciplined public affairs and strategic consulting firm.

"Jim's selection as our CEO follows a comprehensive search process that began earlier this year," said Susan Streifel, chair of the CUNA board's executive search committee and vice chair of the CUNA board. "We are thrilled to welcome Jim to CUNA and believe his experience at the highest levels of Congress and the federal executive branch, as well as his time in association leadership, positions him well to lead our association and represent our members," she added.

A native Iowan, Nussle received a degree in political science from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, and his law degree from Drake University in Des Moines. Nussle and his wife, Karen, have two adult children.  (See related story for more background on CUNA's newly announced president/CEO: Nussle's experience lies in advocacy, fiscal, legislative arenas.)