Steps down...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Tony Snow, the highly visible White House press secretary, will leave his job on Sept. 14 and be replaced by his deputy, Dana Perino, an administration official said Friday. President Bush was to announce the changes during an appearance in the White House briefing room.

Snow, ailing with cancer, had said recently he would leave before the end of Bush's presidency. The father of three children, Snow said he needs to make more than his White House salary of $168,000. He could earn far more money on the speechmaking circuit.

The 52-year-old Snow was a conservative pundit and syndicated talk- show host on Fox News Radio before he was named press secretary on April 26, 2006. He is the latest in a string of White House officials to head for the exits.

Friday was the last day of work for political strategist Karl Rove. Others who have left since Democrats won control of Congress are counselor Dan Bartlett, chief White House attorney Harriet Miers, budget director Rob Portman, political director Sara Taylor, deputy national security adviser J.D. Crouch and Meghan O'Sullivan, another deputy national security adviser who worked on Iraq.

In 2005, Snow had his colon removed and underwent six months of chemotherapy after being diagnosed with cancer. This March, he underwent surgery to remove a growth in his abdominal area, near the site of the original colon cancer.

Doctors determined it was a recurrence of his cancer. He was out of work for five weeks, then returned and underwent chemotherapy, treatments that only recently concluded and have left him thinner, grayer and with less hair.