Obama to Close Political Office and Start 2012 Campaign

NYTimes

WASHINGTON — President Obama will close the office of political affairs at the White House, aides said, restructuring his organization to prepare for his re-election campaign, which is to start building a fund-raising and grass-roots operation based in Chicago by late March.

Mr. Obama has signed off on the plan to set up his campaign headquarters away from Washington, a first for a modern-day presidential re-election campaign. To avoid turf battles, chaotic communications and duplicated efforts, aides said, a significant realignment is underway in the West Wing, with the duties of the political office being taken up by the Democratic National Committee.

The president intends to formally declare his candidacy in about two months by filing papers with the Federal Election Commission, aides said. That step would allow him to start raising money and hiring a team of advisers, whose job it would be to make him the second Democrat since World War II to be elected twice to the White House.

While Mr. Obama is not expected to begin engaging in day-to-day campaign activity and attending fund-raisers until late spring or summer, advisers said, he has settled on the leadership for his re-election effort. The top three officials he has chosen all held important positions in his 2008 campaign, but have been elevated for 2012.

Jim Messina, a deputy White House chief of staff who has overseen operations in the West Wing and acted as a troubleshooter for the president, will manage the campaign. He has started a search for office space in downtown Chicago, spoken with top fund-raisers this week and begun lining up a team of consultants.

“He will be the president of the United States,” Mr. Messina said in an interview, “and we’ll be building this grass-roots campaign, waiting to get an opponent and doing things you’ve got to do.”

In addition to Mr. Messina, aides said, the top leadership team of the re-election bid will include two deputy campaign managers: Julianna Smoot, the White House social secretary who was the finance director of the 2008 campaign, and Jennifer O’Malley Dillon, executive director of the Democratic National Committee, who directed the battleground-state operation in 2008.

The White House political director, Patrick Gaspard, will take over the day-to-day duties of running the Democratic National Committee, with Tim Kaine, the former Virginia governor, still serving as general chairman.

The elimination of the political affairs office at the White House is an effort to erase duplication, aides said. It coincides with the arrival of David Plouffe, who managed the president’s 2008 campaign and began working in the West Wing this month as a senior adviser.

Closing the office will hardly remove politics from the West Wing, considering that the political arena is central to Mr. Plouffe’s portfolio. But aides said that by moving the political director and his staff to the Democratic National Committee, the restructuring of the president’s political operation could reduce the likelihood that it will become a target of an investigation by the Republican-led House Oversight Committee because of the fine line that exists between government and politics.

The personnel moves, which were confirmed in several interviews this week, represent the next step in a major reorganization of the Obama administration. The early date for opening the re-election bid, particularly with no sign of any Democratic primary opponent, highlights the challenges facing Mr. Obama in reviving a network of fund-raisers and grass-roots organizers, some of whom have been critical of the president’s policies over the last two years.

While it may seem premature to begin planning for an election that is 22 months away, the timeline for Mr. Obama is only slightly more accelerated than his two recent predecessors. Bill Clinton filed his re-election papers on April 14, 1995, and George W. Bush formally opened his campaign on May 16, 2003.

But even as Mr. Obama prepares to deliver his State of the Union address on Tuesday, a speech marking the symbolic beginning of a new period of divided government, the early stages of his re-election campaign are quickly coming into view. It will be a curious balancing act, with Mr. Obama extending a hand to Congressional Republicans, even as his advisers map out a strategy to defeat them.

The president and his aides have been discussing placing the re-election headquarters in Chicago for months. The plan came under fresh review in the last two weeks when William M. Daley was hired as the White House chief of staff. He ultimately signed off on the decision, aides said, along with closing the political affairs office of the White House.

Mr. Plouffe will be the main liaison between the White House and the campaign team. He said that he had studied the re-election efforts of Mr. Clinton and Mr. Bush, among other presidents, and dismissed criticism from many Democrats that a Chicago headquarters and the White House could not work together.

“There’s not going to be two dueling power centers,” Mr. Plouffe said in an interview. “The philosophy of this campaign will not be that the White House is somehow running the campaign. The people running the campaign are in charge of the campaign. That’s the way the president wants it. We’ll do it in a coordinated way, but they’re running this thing.”

Locating the headquarters in Chicago provides not only an opportunity to escape the noise and insular views of Washington, aides said, but also serves as something of a loyalty test for campaign workers. Some of them may be feeling burned out after two years of intense work in the administration, on the heels of two years of work on the first presidential campaign.

Mr. Messina will oversee the Chicago office, filling the role that Mr. Plouffe had when Mr. Obama first announced his candidacy four years ago. He will be joined by Ms. Smoot, who will oversee the fund-raising operation, as well as a broad portfolio of projects. Ms. Dillon will oversee the political and field operations.

David Axelrod, who is leaving the White House this month, will also serve as an adviser to the re-election campaign, along with Robert Gibbs, who is set to step down next month as the White House press secretary.

“It’s a huge advantage having the campaign in Chicago,” Mr. Messina said. “What we’re going to do day in and day out is focus on building this campaign from the grass roots up. You will see us do it every single day in ways you can feel and ways you can’t, but that is our absolute charge.”

Penny S. Pritzker, a Chicago businesswoman who served as the national finance chairwoman of the Obama campaign in 2008, will play an advisory role, aides said, but will not lead the finance effort. She is helping to find office space for the campaign headquarters, aides said. The previous space, located on the 11th floor of a downtown office building that sat along the Chicago River, is occupied by another tenant now.

One of the first orders of business for the reorganized political team will be announcing the location of the 2012 Democratic convention. Word could come as early as next week. St. Louis and Charlotte are believed to be leading contenders for the site, according to Democrats familiar with the process, while Cleveland and Minneapolis are said to remain in the running.