Hillary Clinton: U.S. presidential election, 2008/campaign team



The following relates to the campaign team and advisers for Hillary Clinton.

National leadership

 * Terry McAuliffe, National Chairman

Senior consultant: Mark J. Penn
The Wall Street Journal first reported on April 4, 2008, that Penn "met with Colombia's ambassador to the U.S. on Monday to discuss a bilateral free-trade agreement, a pact the presidential candidate (Clinton) opposes." Burson-Marsteller "has a contract with the South American nation to promote congressional approval of the trade deal." The New York Times later noted that Penn apologized for his conflict of loyalty saying "the meeting was an error in judgment." 

"If Clinton seems cautious, it may be because Penn has made caution a science, repeatedly testing issues to determine which ones are safe and widely agreed upon (he was part of the team that encouraged Clinton's husband to run on the issue of school uniforms in 1996)," Anne E. Kornblut wrote April 30, 2007, in the Washington Post.

"If Clinton sounds middle-of-the-road, it may be because Penn is a longtime pollster for the centrist Democratic Leadership Council whose clients have included Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.).

"If Clinton resembles a Washington insider with close ties to the party's biggest donors, it may be because her lead strategist is a wealthy chief executive who heads (Burson-Marsteller) a giant public relations firm, where he personally hones Microsoft's image in Washington.

"And if some opponents see Clinton as arrogant, her campaign a coronation rather than a grass-roots movement, it may be because of the numbers wizard guiding her campaign and the PowerPoint presentations he likes to give on the inevitability of his candidate.

"Yet Penn also has everything that Clinton would want in a senior consultant: undisputed brilliance and experience, according to even his enemies; clear opinions, with data to back them up; unwavering loyalty; and a relentless focus on the endgame: winning the general election. And Clinton clearly adores him. She describes Penn in her autobiography, Living History, as brilliant, intense, shrewd and insightful," Kornblut wrote.

Campaign team members
The following have been identified as Clinton's campaign team members:


 * Andy Berlin, Marketing Team (CEO of WPP Group's Voluntary United Group of Creative Agencies)
 * Maggie Williams, Campaign Manager (Former manager Patti Solis Doyle "will remain a trusted friend and adviser" after she stepped down in favor of Williams, reported Associated Press. .)
 * Leecia Eve, a Senior Policy Adviser
 * Mandy Grunwald, Lead Media Strategist
 * Doug Hattaway, communications backup for N.H. primary; "former spokesman for Vice President Al Gore's 2000 campaign in New Hampshire and then Nashville" and longtime adviser to former N.H. Gov. Jeanne Shaheen
 * Mike Henry, Deputy Campaign Manager
 * Karen Hicks, early organizing
 * Harold Ickes, Adviser to the Campaign Manager
 * Darrell Jackson
 * Evelyn S. Lieberman, Chief Operating Officer
 * Ann Lewis, a Senior Adviser
 * Jonathan Mantz, Finance Director
 * Cheryl Mills, Campaign Lawyer
 * Kim Molstre, Director of Scheduling and Long-term Planning
 * Minyon Moore, a Senior Adviser
 * Capricia Marshall, a Senior Adviser
 * Bob J. Nash, Deputy Campaign Manager
 * Fabian Nunez, California Assembly Speaker as a national co-chair
 * Mark J. Penn, Pollster
 * Jimmy Siegel, Marketing Team (a former BBDO senior executive creative director who is now cd at a-political, an issues advocacy marketing firm/a partnership between Siegel and production house Moxie Pictures.)
 * Phil Singer, Communications Strategist
 * Roy Spence, Marketing Team (CEO of Omnicom Group's GSD&M)
 * Neera Tanden, Policy Director
 * Linda Kaplan Thaler, Media Team
 * Teresa Vilmain, Iowa State Director
 * Tom Vilsack, National Campaign Co-Chair
 * Michael Whouley
 * Maggie Williams, National Campaign Co-Chair
 * JoDee Winterhoff, Iowa Senior Strategist
 * Howard Wolfson, Communications Director

Foreign policy team
Clinton is "regarded as by far the more conservative candidate in that she has carefully triangulated her potential supporters and is unwilling to say that her vote in the Senate in support of the Iraq war was a mistake. She has also positioned herself with the Israel lobby through her pledge to disarm Iran by whatever means necessary and her threat to use nuclear weapons on terrorists. Her foreign policy advisers are a who's who of neoliberal hawks, including former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who famously believed that the deaths of 500,000 Iraqi children due to sanctions was 'worth it.' Clinton is also being advised by Richard Holbrooke, who is reported to be close to Paul Wolfowitz. Holbrooke is a possible candidate for secretary of state if Clinton is elected president. Holbrooke has been a supporter of the Iraq war, and he was an architect of the 1999 bombing of Serbia. Strobe Talbott, who advised Bill Clinton and was also involved with the bombing of Serbia, is reported to be another Hillary adviser," Philip Giraldi wrote August 14, 2007, at Antiwar.com. TheRealNews.com has a report on Hillary Clinton's foreign policy advisors.

In October 2007, the Washington Post published a list of Clinton's foreign policy advisers.


 * Madeleine K. Albright, "President Clinton’s secretary of state and now chairperson of the National Democratic Institute, foreign policy adviser"
 * Samuel R. Berger, "President Clinton’s national security adviser and now a principal at business consultancy Stonebridge, foreign policy adviser"
 * Lt. Gen. Daniel William Christman, "a former West Point superintendent and now senior vice president for international affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, foreign policy adviser"
 * Gen. Wesley K. Clark, "President Clinton’s Kosovo commander and now a Democratic fundraiser, endorsed Sen. Clinton Sept. 15 [2007]"
 * John H. Dalton, "President Clinton’s Navy secretary and now president of the Financial Services Roundtable’s Housing Policy Council, veterans and military retirees for Hillary"
 * Lee Feinstein, "a deputy in President Clinton’s State Department, national security coordinator"
 * Leslie H. Gelb, "president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, a former New York Times correspondent and a former State and Defense Department official, informal adviser"
 * Richard C. Holbrooke, "President Clinton’s UN ambassador and broker of the Dayton Peace Accords (and now a Washington Post columnist), foreign policy adviser"
 * Martin S. Indyk, "President Clinton’s ambassador to Israel and now director of Brookings’s Saban Center for Middle East Policy, foreign policy adviser"
 * Gen. John M. ("Jack") Keane, "a former Army vice chief of staff who co-crafted the Iraq 'surge' and is now a military analyst (sometimes for ABC news), military issues adviser"
 * Lt. Gen. Claudia J. Kennedy, "former deputy chief of staff for intelligence, veterans and military retirees for Hillary"
 * Lt. Gen. Donald L. Kerrick, "President Clinton’s deputy national security adviser, organizes meetings of retired officers"
 * Col. Andrew F. Krepinevich, "president of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, briefed Hillary Clinton as well as Sen. John McCain and Gov. Bill Richardson"
 * Vali Nasr, "Naval Postgraduate School professor, Middle East adviser"
 * Michael E. O'Hanlon, "Brookings senior fellow and former Congressional Budget Office defense and foreign policy analyst, supporter"
 * Rep. (and retired Vice Adm.) Joseph Sestak, veterans and military retirees for Hillary"
 * Andrew Shapiro, "Sen. Clinton’s Senate foreign policy staffer"
 * Jeffrey H. Smith, "former CIA general counsel and now a partner leading the public policy and government contracts group of law firm Arnold & Porter, national security adviser"
 * Strobe Talbott, "Brookings president, informal adviser"
 * Togo D. West, "President Clinton’s secretary for veterans affairs and former secretary of the Army, veterans and military retirees for Hillary"
 * Former Amb. Joseph C. Wilson IV, "the half of the Plamegate couple who criticized the administration for using questionable evidence to promote the Iraq war, endorsed Sen. Clinton July 16 [2007]"

External articles

 * Dan Balz and Chris Cillizza, "Hillary Clinton's Early Moves. No Decision on '08 Bid, But Campaign Machine Is Already Humming," Washington Post, December 6, 2006.
 * Michelle Cottle, "Hillary Control/ The women of 'Hillaryland' have constructed a carefully managed, always on-message, leakproof campaign. But is this a good thing?" New York Magazine, 2007.
 * "Clinton Assembles a Seasoned Team," Washington Post, January 21, 2007.
 * Ben Smith, "Hillary's Hammer Returns," The Politico, April 18, 2007.
 * Anne E. Kornblut, "Clinton's PowerPointer. With Data and Slides, a Pollster Guides Campaign Strategy," Washington Post, April 30, 2007.
 * Jason Horowitz, "Hot Policy Wonks For The Democrats: The New Realists," New York Observer, August 20, 2007.
 * Lynda Waddington, "Clinton Campaign Names New Caucus Director," Iowa Independent, September 28, 2007.
 * "Clinton owes Penn's firm $2.5 million," United Press International, April 8, 2008.
 * Lorraine Woellert, "Clinton Adviser Penn Is Flash Point as Unions Pounce," Bloomberg News, April 9, 2008.

External resources

 * See Hillary Rodham Clinton presidential campaign, 2008 in the Wikipedia.