Calif.: Two More Bush Vets Join Arnold
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) is continuing his raid on top talent from President Bush's 2004 campaign, recruiting two more well-regarded GOP operatives in recent days.
Katie Levinson, who is currently the director of White House television operations, will soon join the Schwarzenegger campaign as its communications director. Matt McDonald, who handles much of the Bush administration's rapid response efforts, will move to California to set up a similar operation for Schwarzenegger. Levinson, who is viewed in GOP circles as a major recruit in the 2008 presidential staff sweepstakes, handled television strategy and planning for the Republican National Committee in 2004. McDonald worked on Bush's rapid-response team in 2004 and previously did a stint at the National Republican Congressional Committee.
The two new hires join campaign manager Steve Schmidt and senior adviser Matthew Dowd as members of the Schwarzenegger hierarchy with close ties to Bush.
The similarity in campaign teams seems to suggest that Schwarzenegger is planning to use the Bush blueprint in his own reelection fight against whoever wins the Democratic primary -- state Controller Steve Westly (D) or state Treasurer Phil Angelides (D). That model relied heavily on growing the pool of potential Bush voters through an extremely specialized targeting operation, a strategy that led to Bush receiving 12 million more votes in 2004 than in 2000 -- a 23 percent increase. It remains to be seen whether such an effort can succeed in California, where Democrats have a clear voter registration edge.
Schwarzenegger's reelection prospects at the moment are cloudy. After riding a wave of public support in the wake of his recall election victory in 2003, Schwarzenegger struggled to recapture that backing in 2005 -- a year punctuated by the failure of a series of ballot initiatives he backed in a November special election. Democrats who seemed willing to give Schwarzenegger the benefit of the doubt initially appear to have abandoned him in droves.
Since the 2005 special election, Schwarzenegger has restructured his political team -- bringing in Democrat Susan Kennedy as his new chief of staff and adding Schmidt, Dowd, Levinson and McDonald. The Governator also ended his formal relationship with political Svengali Mike Murphy -- although both sides insist that the high-profile media consultant will be involved in the campaign on a volunteer basis.
By
Chris Cillizza
|
February 8, 2006; 2:42 PM ET
Categories:
Governors
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Posted by: dale | February 10, 2006 2:04 PM | Report abuse
Cillizza's recital of California recent history leaves out the most important details, as usual.
What can be more boring than an Arnie discussion without including the idiotic red meat statements he's made about the California nurses and government workers being "special interest groups" and how he doesn't pay attention to them....Let's see how many of those rich Republican backers who go into an ER after a car accident would refuse the services of the people on the front lines in our society.
That and the budget cuts of social services is why our governor is having trouble...Is Cillizza interested?...naaah!
Posted by: Richard Ray Harris | February 8, 2006 7:01 PM | Report abuse
Perfect! Now if Arnie can just get John Kerry to run against him, he might have a chance of retaining the governorship. Otherwise... hasta la vista, baby! You WON'T be back.
Posted by: ErrinF | February 8, 2006 5:51 PM | Report abuse
The Bush forumla won't work in a blue state like California. Simply relying on the conservative base won't get it done. He will therefore campaign in the center regardless of who he recruits from the Bush team. These people are shameless enough to appeal to reactionaires when it suits them and navigate back to the center when necessary. They have no real core and don't believe in anything.
Posted by: Intrepid Liberal | February 8, 2006 4:35 PM | Report abuse
Remember when the ridiculous Orrin Hatch wanted to alter the Constitution for one man? Yep, Hatch wanted to remove the "born in the USA" provision in order to allow Arnold to run for president. I wonder if Hatch still feels this way.
Posted by: Burlington, VT | February 8, 2006 3:58 PM | Report abuse
The comments to this entry are closed.
arnie's an idiot. the only person he's smarter than is gw.
he wont win a 2nd term unless he gets diebold on board to invaladate votes.
this person borrowed california's way out of debt.
does that mean they dont owe any money now?
will they have to pay that off?
"i'll be back" will go back where he came from. this is a sick man, playing with other women in front of his wife.