Edward W. Gillespie, counselor to President Bush, is no stranger to controversy.
He was an outspoken advocate for Bush during the 2000 voter recount in Florida.
And soon after he became counselor to the president last year, he set up a rapid-response PR team to counter critics of the military surge in Iraq.
So it’s no surprise that Gillespie became the point man when the White House decided to take on NBC News over the editing of an interview Sunday between the president and Richard Engel, the network’s chief foreign correspondent.
Engel, who has been stationed in Iraq during most of the war, sat down with Bush in Egypt as the president finished up a trip to the Middle East.
Portions of the 15-minute interview appeared on “NBC Nightly News” Sunday and on “The Today Show” on Monday morning.
In an e-mail to Steve Capus, president of NBC News, Gillespie accused NBC of “deceitful editing.”
He argued that the edited version of the interview conveyed several false impressions, one of them being that Bush was opposed to any negotiating with Iran.
Bush had told Engel that there could be talks if Iran first suspended its uranium enrichment program.
In his response to Gillespie, Capos defended the editing of the interview.
He also noted that the section of the interview in dispute did run in its entirety on “The Today Show” and that the entire interview is available on NBC News’ website. (On Monday Brian Williams, the Nightly News anchor, directed viewers interested in the interview to the website.)
Gillespie didn’t get what he said he wanted - a full airing of the disputed parts on the interview - but his letter probably served its purpose.
It drew attention to the president’s positions, and it put the media on the defensive. For sure, it gave fodder to the cable talk shows.
And it may have driven people to the full interview, a session in which both Engel and Bush politely, but insistently, present alternate views of the situations in Iraq and the Middle East.
Certainly, the episode shows that Gillespie has taken on some of the tasks left behind last summer by Karl Rove, Bush’s longtime political adviser.
At the time of Rove’s departure in August, The Washington Post speculated that Gillespie would be asked to “handle political strategy and message management for the president.”
Gillespie has a wealth of experience with both tasks, both in politics and in the private sector. He was a top aide to former Rep. Dick Armey, and he helped draft the 1994 Republican “Contract with America.”
He has also served as chairman of the Republican National Committee.
In 2000, Gillespie joined with Jack Quinn, former chief of staff to Vice President Al Gore, to form the public relations and lobbying firm of Quinn Gillespie & Associates LLC.
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