Bayh Adds Another to Team

Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh (D) has hired Marc Farinella to run his All America political action committee, another move aimed at cementing his political team for a likely run for president in 2008.

Farinella served as chief of staff to Missouri Gov. Mel Carnahan (D) and managed Carnahan's race against Sen. John Ashcroft (R) in 2000. Carnahan was killed in a plane crash just weeks before the November election, but his name remained on the ballot. After winning a posthumous victory, the acting governor appointed Carnahan's wife -- Jean -- to the Senate. Farinella was also involved in Jean Carnahan's (D) race for the remaining four years on her husband's term, a contest she lost to Sen. Jim Talent (R) in 2002.

After that defeat, Farinella helped to found a soft-money organization (along with Monica Dixon, who is now a senior adviser to ex-Virginia Gov. Mark Warner's Forward Together PAC) designed to raise cash to influence Senate races. The venture never took off and Farinella joined veteran media consultant Saul Shorr's firm.

Farinella is currently a partner in Murphy Putnam Shorr & Partners and has done work in races in Florida, Pennsylvania and North Carolina in recent years. He replaces Steve Bouchard, who left Bayh's PAC late last year. Bouchard is now the director of state affairs at the Association of Trial Lawyers of America.

Farinella joins Bayh chief of staff Tom Sugar, deputy chief of staff Linda Moore Forbes, communications director Dan Pfeiffer, media consultant Anita Dunn, pollster Paul Maslin, former Clinton administration official Ron Klain and fundraiser Nancy Jacobson in the Indiana senator's inner circle.

By Chris Cillizza  |  March 10, 2006; 8:30 AM ET
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