Fred completes overhaul, campaign goes ‘corporate’

Fred Thompson has put the finishing touches on a six-week staff sweep that has transformed his campaign from a guerrilla-tactics style insurgency into more of a “corporate” machine that will follow a traditional playbook.

{mosads}Thompson’s campaign manager, William Lacy, disputes that the operation has become old school, citing Thompson’s announcement on ‘The Tonight Show with Jay Leno’ the same night as a GOP presidential debate and a Web video speaking directly to supporters about the rationale for his bid.

Some do not regard these tactics as very original. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) announced his candidacy on ‘The Late Show with David Letterman.’ And Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) declared her bid with a Web video months ago.

Thompson completed the transformation of his campaign two days before his announcement  with the departure of Jim Mills, a longtime field producer for Fox News. This sparked the resignation of the Mark Corallo, who had recruited his friend Mills and who was an architect of Thompson’s early campaign.

Thompson began cleaning house at the end of July when he fired would-be campaign manager Tom Collamore after Collamore clashed with the candidate’s wife, Jeri, and lost her confidence, said sources with first-hand knowledge of what happened. Collamore had been brought in by Ken Rietz, former chief operating officer at Burson-Marsteller and a longtime friend of Thompson’s.

Soon after Collamore left, Thompson’s director of opposition research, J.T. Mastranadi quit. Things stayed quiet for a few weeks until campaign spokeswoman Burson Snyder resigned and then a few days later the campaign announced the departure of communications director Linda Rozett.

In scope and magnitude, the shakeup approaches McCain’s campaign overhaul this summer, which saw the ouster of McCain’s campaign manager Terry Nelson and his chief political strategist John Weaver after a dispute over spending and fundraising.

Thompson revamped his campaign because it had not built up much of an operation during the late spring and early summer.

Before taking over for Collamore, Lacy asked about the campaign’s budget, key state targeting plan, polling, and finance plan. “I was told that most of that stuff didn’t exist,” he said, “There was no written campaign strategy, no written campaign plan, no polling, no plan for polling, no announcement plan.

“People told me the announcement was going to take place at the Ryman Auditorium,” he said, referring to the home of the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. “That was not a plan, that was an idea.”

The lack of progress on the Thompson campaign was apparent to members of the Republican political community in Washington, some of whom had ties to the Thompson campaign.

“They were light on the political campaign experience side,” said one Republican close to the campaign. “Nothing was getting done internally. They were not organizing in the states or doing anything to prepare them once an announcement was made.”

Since Lacy took over, the campaign conducted its first poll within the last three weeks and began hiring staff in key states. He also filled key campaign posts with operatives with substantial national political campaign experience. As Lacy has seized the campaign reins, the control of advisers such as Rietz and Verizon strategist Ed McFadden, who originally drew up a campaign plan of revolutionary style and tactics, has waned.  Rietz makes fewer day-to-day management decisions and is focusing on big-picture strategy and fundraising.

Replacing Rozett, a longtime U.S. Chamber of Commerce official and Mills, both well-respected and well-known members of Washington’s political establishment who are not traditional political strategists but viewed as outside-the-box thinkers, has raised questions about whether Thompson will pursue the vision of his original campaign architects.

“From Day One, we talked about how if Fred was going to run for president it was going to be a different kind of campaign and we needed super intelligent and super creative people who really understood national politics and had the ability to connect with the American people and who really understood Fred’s message,” said Corallo. “Jim Mills was at the top of that list. I personally recruited him and introduced him to Fred and Jeri and they agreed he was the right guy. Jim is one of the most brilliant, creative thinkers that I know.”

Thompson and his wife invited Mills to their home to personally recruit him. His switch from television news to presidential politics surprised the Capitol Hill community, where he is a well-known and liked figure. His departure from Thompson’s campaign about two weeks after being hired stunned many on the Hill.

Lacy said that he asked Mills to stay on. But it would not have been in the role promised, as communications director and traveling press secretary with direct access to the candidate and a hand in campaign strategy.

“I was having a great time at Fox with zero interest in doing anything presidential,” said Mills. “Then all of a sudden one of my best friends, the candidate, and the candidate’s wife all tell me I was the guy they wanted to be a key player in this new-style, outside-the-box, have-some-fun, guerrilla tactics, campaign team.  Very cool stuff until it became pretty clear that this ‘new style’ campaign was going to look a lot more like an insurance agency than ‘The Boys on the Bus.’”
Mills had made clear to Thompson and his wife on numerous occasions that he did not have any national presidential campaign experience and was assured that would not be a problem.

When Lacy took over operations, things changed. Lacy wanted a campaign communications director who had experience working on a national political campaign. He hired Todd Harris, who worked on McCain’s 2000 presidential campaign and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s (R) 2002 reelection campaign.

One Republican close to Thompson’s campaign said the transition from insurgent-type campaign to a traditional-type one that follows the conventional playbook was inevitable.

But other Thompson supporters question whether he can win without running a very innovative campaign, where creative people from outside traditional politics make key decisions.

Because Thompson has entered the race so late, he is far less organized than his rivals. For example, in Iowa he has about four paid staffers. In New Hampshire, he has two. In South Carolina — a state supporters say he must win — Thompson has three paid aides. In Florida, site of another crucial contest, he has hired six staffers. The campaign is expected to hire more staff around the country in the coming days.

Clinton, by comparison, had more than 70 paid staffers in Iowa as of July.