Tad Devine is going to be a strategist and adviser to @AndrewYang, per people familiar… bringing decades of political experience to a campaign that just raised $10m in Q3 and has grassroots support… will be interesting to watch if Yang can pull any support from Sanders wing
— Robert Costa (@costareports) October 23, 2019
*THIS* Tad Devine?
Tad Devine worked with Manfort in Ukraine. The guy here at the end of the table with them is Konstantine Kilimnik, former GRU, indicted by Mueller. You can read all about him in the Mueller report.
Yang must have at least Googled Tad Devine which means he knows and doesn't care. pic.twitter.com/vk38cvATkJ
— Griz (@grizatlcp) October 23, 2019
From the Daily Beast:
… On Wednesday, Politico reported that the Yang campaign was hiring the firm Devine, Mulvey, and Longabaugh to help with media consulting. The firm has, for years, worked with a slate of Democratic candidates on federal and state races. But it’s best known for its work on Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign, on which Tad Devine—one of the firm’s namesakes—served as a senior adviser.
Both Devine and the firm were set to reprise their roles in 2020. But they ended up not joining the Sanders election effort after what was described as strategic difference. In reality, the decision was largely driven by the belief within Sanders’ orbit that they could save money—and do a better job coordinating messages—if they simply produced their ads in house.
“I’ve seen reporting that suggests they quit,” Sanders’ campaign manager, Faiz Shakir, told The Daily Beast. “They did not quit; Senator Sanders never brought them on.”…
“He didn’t break up with us, we broke up with him!”
Maybe Yang (or more likely, his staffers) *didn’t* bother to google Devine. Maybe they honestly believed, hey — guy smart enough not to get busted when his partner is in the federal pen must be a good strategist! Maybe they’re dumb/naive enough to believe the fantasy Tad can lure wavering Sandernistas into their camp.
(TBH, I had more respect for Devine when it seemed like his firm was smart enough to stay away from BernieBust Mk.II, or at least smart enough to lie low until it was certain Manafort wasn’t going to tell the feds anything they didn’t already know.)
But mostly I’m reminded of a quote from baseball great Casey Stengel:
“Been in this game one-hundred years, but I see new ways to lose ’em I never knew existed before.”
Adam L Silverman
I saw Shakir interviewed on MSNBC yesterday by Katie Tur and he was twitchy and squirrelly as hell. His body posture and movement, his facial expressions and micro expressions, were in hyperdrive. And they were all negative. If someone would let me do a semi-structured interview with him, within five minutes I could get him to tell me everything of his own volition just by being nice to and interested in him. And that includes what his kinesiology is telling me.
West of the Rockies
He seems like a lightweight, not someone to take seriously in this arena. I hope he bows out soon and takes another 5 or 6 with him.
NotMax
Devine intervention ain’t a-gonna help.
anarchoRex
Yup, sure, a political messaging outfit turned down the opportunity to make millions of dollars from the leading fundraising campaign in the primary. I’m convinced.
West of the Rockies
@NotMax:
Ha! Funny and true.
MobiusKlein
@Adam L Silverman: I’m twitchy and in hyperdrive.
Please don’t interview me either.
P.S. I do not have any access to any fortune 500 company secrets or logins.
P.P.S. Actually I do. Please don’t interview me.
joel hanes
Hiring Tad Devine is disqualifying.
Ruckus
@joel hanes:
Yes. Yes it is.
However it isn’t the only thing.
I’ve wondered if a bunch of the people running for the democratic nomination actually have any concept of winning and actually have/had ulterior motives, such as drawing votes away from someone or someones, thereby making a very contested convention. IE a ringer. Because a number of the people running have about as much chance as I would and that chance is a minus.
Mary G
Yang was one of the first to jump on the “How dare you call sweet little Tulsi” a Russian asset. I think he’s Putin’s Option C to pull off techbros, because he’s revolutionary. He refused to wear a tie to the debate!
Quaker in a Basement
+1 for the Stengel quote. I was just telling the missus about Casey last night.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Quaker in a Basement: Casey was a long time Glendale resident, he’s buried at Forest Lawn, Glendale.
NotMax
*sigh*
Went to Google to check out one damn thing and ended up falling into multiple recipe site rabbit holes for two hours.
lgerard
Casey’s lament would make a apt slogan for the trump maladministration
Can’t anyone here play this game?
J R in WV
@NotMax:
I’m glad to hear that.
Means it isn’t just me who does that!
NotMax
@J R in WV
(best Jimmy Durante impression) “It’s unsidious, I tells ya!”
:)
Barb 2
@Mary G:
That was a moment – it is a must know for all candidates shady history. Her association with Assad. Google Assad and Gabbard for her shady history. We don’t need a female Trump.
Then there is Bernie Sanders’ campaign manager working for Manaford in the Ukraine. I listen to the security experts when they explain Russian assets etc.
Playing around with the Russians/Putin is a no-no for candidates.
mrmoshpotato
@NotMax: @J R in WV: Haha – there’s this thing called YouTube that you definitely should avoid then.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: And you found a Hillbilly at the bottom, didn’t you?
Betty Cracker
I love a good conspiracy theory as well as the next person, but Tad Devine also served as a senior strategist in the Al Gore and John Kerry presidential campaigns. Maybe he’s just a shitty mercenary?
satby
Jeez that’s sloppy reporting. Devine is not the firm’s namesake, he’s a named partner in the firm. As in, one of the founders (or son of, not bothering to look it up).
HinTN
@Betty Cracker: Maybe that’s why they lost and the interference just wasn’t so blatantly obvious then.
JWR
@Mary G:
@Barb 2:
So we have Tulsi, Beto, Yang, and now the Queen of Rooskie Assets …
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker: Killjoy.
rikyrah
@joel hanes:
?????
Betty Cracker
@HinTN: It’s possible that Russians have been rigging our elections for 20 years and no evidence surfaced until 2016, but I think it’s more likely that Devine is just a shitty strategist.
Kathleen
@HinTN: It was blatantly obvious to me.
JML
Tad Devine is a hired gun. That’s all. He and his firm aren’t vetting clients for ideological compatability or alignment: they craft political and media strategies for those who can pay. Not sure I’d read all that much more into this.
I’ve worked for clients who considered hiring his firm, I’ve been in the pitch meeting before. They know how to put on a show, and they know how to cash your checks. (We didn’t hire them. It was the right choice)
Yang is amateur hour. Hiring a high level media firm like this is the sort of thing you do to try to show you’re a serious candidate. But because Yang is amateur hour, he probably doesnt even realize the political baggage Devine has trailing him around now after doing a) a bunch of foreign political jobs and B) working Bernie’s campaign 4 years ago.
Foreign political jobs didnt used to be a big deal; no one really noticed them. But most of these folks did foreign jobs in places like Israel or Australia, where the money and the work was on the up and up. Its only more recently where you’ve seen high profile people going for big pay days with more sketchy people in sketchier countries.
the Conster
@Betty Cracker:
I’m sorry, but that’s naive. Once you work for Putin (or a mob boss, same thing) you always work for them. Devine was right there with Manafort at the front lines, developing the “lock her up” chant against Yulia Tymoshenko in Ukraine. The most awesome twitter thread I’ve ever read was from a cable TV installer in DC who told the tale about going to a house to fix their internet service and before the big burly guy with a Russian accent who answered the door let him into the basement to do his job, he had to snort a line of coke, and couldn’t leave until he did. When he got into the basement, there were a bunch of other Russian guys on computers, waiting to resume whatever shady thing they were up to.
That’s how they work, and that’s how it’s done for everyone who works for them.
glory b
@JWR: As I recall, the original, European Green Party said that J. Stein’s outfit was not actually the Green Party and they urged people in the US to vote for Clinton, not Stein.
Reminding you guys again about Stein’s Green Party taking Repub money to screw us.