Murphy won't join McCain campaign
Posted: Tuesday, July 08, 2008 1:13 PM by Mark Murray
Filed Under:
2008, McCain
From NBC's Chuck Todd and Mark Murray
Republican political strategist Mike Murphy -- who worked on John McCain's 2000 presidential bid and also once served as an adviser to Mitt Romney and Arnold Schwarzenegger -- tells First Read that he WON'T be joining the McCain campaign.
After last week's medium-sized shakeup in the McCain campaign, in which adviser Steve Schmidt took over the day-to-day reins from manager Rick Davis, it was widely speculated that Murphy might eventually join the campaign.
The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder, who first reported this news, has more: "Though Murphy has told associates that McCain asked him to come aboard ten days ago, he has come to believe that the press speculation about his arrival has become a maelstrom of insanity and is damaging McCain... Several current senior aides to McCain have come to believe that Murphy is waging a subterranean campaign to pressure McCain into publicly asking him to come on board. McCain has denied to several of these aides that he asked Murphy to return."
"Reports that Murphy and current campaign CEO Steve Schmidt do not get along are disputed by some close to McCain but accepted as correct by others; the two do talk regularly, although they have different ideas about how to reform the campaign."
