O'Connor leaving to run Dean's presidential campaign full time

By Anonymous -
The campaign is in the process of moving out of Montpelier and into Burlington. This is a good strategic move, placing the campaign headquarters just across the lake from New York, and a quick drive down I-87 to Albany-- a powerhouse of regional politics. Dean's a Yankee himself, born in NYC, and already has commitment from some former top McCain staffers in NY to join the Dean campaign. Here are some excerpts from the article:


Kate O’Connor, who described herself as the “governor’s political director” in last month’s New Republic magazine profile of Dean, said the campaign was doing better than originally projected and a larger staff was needed to handle the growing work. “We’re ahead of where we thought we’d be,”.... O’Connor said the “Dean for America” headquarters was being moved from Montpelier to Burlington, and four other staffers were either hired or were being hired. The change is effective Sept. 1. O’Connor said fund raising was a big priority now. “We’re working on finding a national fund-raising director,” she said....

O’Connor said she would continue to travel with Dean on all his trips to drum up support for his dark-horse candidacy. While the governor is in Vermont most of this week, next week the political trips begin again. They are due to spend five days in Iowa, she said.

O’Connor has worked for Dean since he was lieutenant governor; she started as his only campaign aide. This fall will mark 13 years she has worked for Dean. Before that, O’Connor worked on the campaign of former Gov. Madeleine Kunin, and her first job after she graduated from Bates College in Maine with a degree in political science was answering the telephones at the office of New York Rep. Tom Downey (who was Al Gore's Governor Bush in debate prep before the tape-fiasco that had him stepping down, and Begala took his place--probably a bad replacement)...

Dean’s presidential office will be at 95 St. Paul St. and will be staffed with two field work staffers, a fund-raiser, and a staff assistant and O’Connor. O’Connor said she is moving to Burlington. The two political field workers will be Abby Trebilcock of St. Johnsbury, a recent University of Vermont graduate who was in an intern in the governor’s office; and Aaron Holmes, who worked for Massachusetts Democrat Steve Grossman’s campaign for governor until Grossman dropped out of the race.

For the past several months, O’Connor has been splitting her time between Dean’s campaign and her duties in Montpelier. O’Connor ran Dean’s re-election campaigns, but her lack of experience outside of Vermont has been noted in the national media profiles.


Trippi (who has run national campaigns for Brown, Hart...), laid forth his ideas on the campaign in the TAP article, which was looked at here, Trippi's strategy for the Dean campaign.



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