Name John Weaver | Role Political consultant | |
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John Weaver is an American political consultant best known for his work on the John McCain presidential campaigns of 2000 and 2008. In between, he worked for a time for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. He was also the chief strategist for the presidential campaign of Republican John Kasich.
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Life and career
Weaver was born and raised in Kermit, Texas and has one daughter and one son.
McCain adviser
He was described as one of McCain's "closest advisers" and "an architect of McCain's 'Straight Talk Express,'" and left the McCain campaign in July 2007, along with campaign manager Terry Nelson, political director Rob Jesmer, and deputy campaign manager Reed Galen, following several consecutive months of poor fund-raising.
In 2004, Weaver appeared in the documentary film (based on the 2003 book of the same name) Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential, which alleges that Karl Rove, former campaign manager and Deputy White House Chief of Staff to President George W. Bush, was behind a South Carolina push poll during the 2000 Republican primary that used racist innuendo to undermine support for McCain by asking voters: "Would you be more likely or less likely to vote for John McCain for president if you knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child?" In the film, Weaver assigns blame to Rove, stating "I believe I know where that decision was made; it was at the top of the [Bush] campaign".
In 2008, Weaver made headlines within the Washington beltway during the John McCain lobbyist controversy when some American media personalities speculated about his involvement in an article published by The New York Times that questioned the propriety of McCain's relationship with lobbyist Vicki Iseman. Weaver denied speaking to the paper without the campaign's approval.
Weaver and Mark Salter are viewed as two of the aides who are closest to McCain.
Huntsman and Kasich aide
Weaver served as the chief strategist for Jon Huntsman's 2012 presidential campaign. After Mitt Romney's defeat in the November 2012 general election, Weaver tweeted, "In our party, intolerance can no longer be tolerated".
By June 2015, Weaver had been hired to work on the prospective presidential campaign of Ohio Governor John Kasich. Acting as Kasich's strategist viewing the Feb. 20, 2016 South Carolina primary, Weaver is quoted in The Atlantic as saying, “We want to do well enough to keep Jeb from doing well. If we knock him out of the race, it’s a victory.”