WASHINGTON – John Kerry (search) is adding some of the Democratic Party's most experienced strategists to his team for the stretch drive against President Bush, including hometown allies from Boston and top advisers of former President Clinton.
"Everybody wants to help us win," said campaign manager Mary Beth Cahill (search).
Michael Whouley (search), the Boston operative who helped salvage Kerry's candidacy in Iowa, is returning to the Democratic presidential campaign to help strengthen Kerry's state-by-state political organizations and to provide general strategic advice. Cahill said he had held similar jobs in the past three Democratic presidential campaigns.
Doug Sosnik (search), a political adviser in the Clinton White House, has joined the Democratic National Committee as a general strategist. As titular head of the party, Kerry has placed aides in key positions at the DNC.
Also joining the Kerry team:
— Regena Thomas, secretary of state in New Jersey, will help the DNC's voter turnout operation.
— Jack Corrigan, who looked out for Kerry's interests at the Democratic Convention in Boston, will join the DNC's legal team.
— Marcia Hale, director of intergovernmental affairs in the Clinton White House, will help the DNC coordinate the activities of senior Democrats campaigning on Kerry's behalf.
— Gerry Salemme, former chief of staff to Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., has joined the campaign as Cahill's deputy to help with day-to-day operations.
— Bill Lynch, former deputy mayor of New York, is a deputy campaign manager helping Kerry reach out to black voters.
On Election Night in 2000, Whouley was among the first strategists to recognize that then-Vice President Al Gore was closing the gap on Bush in Florida, and sent word that the candidate should not concede. Bush won the presidency more than a month later, when the Supreme Court stopped a recount in Florida.
In 2003, when Kerry decided to focus his ailing campaign in Iowa, he asked Whouley to travel the state and help John Norris finish putting a precinct-by-precinct organization together. Kerry won Iowa's caucuses, and Norris now heads the campaign's national "field" operations — its state-by-state organizing effort.
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