Bachmann Loses Top Two Senior Campaign Managers
Michele Bachmann has lost her campaign manager and her deputy campaign manager, casting Bachmann’s reputation in a dark light. Ed Rollins, the Bachmann campaign manager, recently stepped down, reportedly for health reasons, and is staying on in an advisory role. “Deputy campaign manager David Polyansky is reportedly exiting over strategic differences,” writes The Huffington Post.
Maggie Haberman at Politico adds,
“I wish Michele nothing but the best, and anyone who underestimates her as a candidate does so at their own peril,” Polyansky told POLITICO.
But a GOP source familiar with the situation said that Polyansky had “strategic differences on the path forward” with the candidate, who has struggled to gain traction in the last few weeks.
Polyansky and Rollins led the team that brought Bachmann to her Ames Straw Poll win in Iowa, along with a handful of others like veteran pollster Ed Goeas. It wasn’t immediately clear who was taking over the top two day-to-day slots.
Bachmann is known for having had an unusually large number of staffers from her congressional office depart in a short time frame, although a campaign spokeswoman said they’d always planned on restructuring.
But Reuters has a different take:
Asked if Polyansky’s departure involved strategic differences with the candidate, Rollins said, “There’s no strategic differences in the sense of what we should be doing or saying — it’s just a question of how you use your time, how you use your resources.”
The Washington Post adds,
Hovering over the departures is Bachmann’s reputation. She, more than most members of Congress, is notorious for the amount of staff turnover in her congressional office, going through numerous chiefs of staff, including some who don’t speak highly of the congresswoman these days.
What does “don’t speak highly” mean?
The Minnesota Post reported in June:
Ron Carey, the former Minnesota Republican state chair, former chief of staff for Congresswoman Michele Bachmann and a native Iowan, has an op-ed in today’s Des Moines Register touting former Gov. Tim Pawlenty and dissing Bachmann.
He writes:
Having seen the two of them, up close and over a long period of time, it is clear to me that while Tim Pawlenty possesses the judgment, the demeanor, and the readiness to serve as president, Michele Bachmann decidedly does not.
Carey resigned as her chief of staff a year ago, after five months on the job, and has made no secret of his feelings about her abilities. He continues today:
The Bachmann campaign and congressional offices I inherited were wildly out of control. Stacks upon stacks of unopened contributions filled the campaign office while thousands of communications from citizens waited for an answer. If she is unable, or unwilling, to handle the basic duties of a campaign or congressional office, how could she possibly manage the magnitude of the presidency?
Ouch.
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