Post PoliticsWest article soft-pedaled backgrounds of GOP's Wadhams, Britt

Summary: In an article about the leaders of Colorado's Democratic and Republican parties, The Denver Post's PoliticsWest website reported on GOP chair Dick Wadhams disputing Democrat Pat Waak's remark that "he can get pretty nasty at times" by claiming that it was "an excessive characterization." However, despite the Post's previous reporting that described Wadhams as "politically brutal," the article did not mention his history of negative campaigning. Additionally, the article referred to Colorado GOP executive director Mike Britt but omitted that he is one of numerous former Bush administration White House staffers identified in a congressional investigation related to the use of GOP email accounts for official government business.

In a March 29 article on its PoliticsWest website, The Denver Post reported that Colorado Republican Party chairman Dick Wadhams disputed Democratic Party chair Pat Waak's contention during a recent joint appearance that "he can get pretty nasty at times" by stating that it was "kind of crazy" and "an excessive characterization." However, the Post failed to report as context for Waak's remark that Wadhams has a history of negative campaigning and that the Post itself has described him as "politically brutal," as Colorado Media Matters has noted.

Further, the article by PoliticsWest editor Stephen Keating reported that after Wadhams agreed to manage the senate campaign of Bob Schaffer, "Mike Britt, who formerly worked for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign, was named executive director" of the Colorado Republican Party. The article did not mention that, as Colorado Media Matters has noted, Britt is a former White House staffer who was one of a number named in a congressional investigation seeking to uncover "whether White House officials violated the Presidential Records Act by using e-mail accounts maintained by the Republican National Committee [RNC] and the Bush Cheney '04 campaign for official White House communications."

From the article "Throwing chairs: Waak and Wadhams spar in public," by Stephen Keating, published March 29 on The Denver Post's PoliticsWest website:

Wadhams and Waak, polar opposites on the political spectrum in both substance and style, have been thrust together in the 2008 campaign spotlight, appearing on about a half-dozen panels in the past year.

"I've seen a lot of political operatives and Dick is not better, frankly, than the other ones I've seen," said Waak in an interview. "We have tended to get along. The biggest challenge for me is he can get pretty nasty at times. I try not to do that, because it belittles the intelligence of the people we're talking to."

Nasty?

"I think that's kind of crazy," Wadhams responded. "I would probably take issue with that characterization. Nasty is an excessive characterization."

Contrary to Wadhams' assertion that "[n]asty is an excessive characterization" and that it is "kind of crazy," The Washington Monthly in a September 2006 profile of Wadhams provided a litany of examples in which it reported Wadhams has "taken ... low blows to new heights, combining blistering verbal assaults, nasty wedge issues, and general loud-mouthing in an astonishingly effective manner." Examples included an incident the publication noted from the Wadhams-managed 2004 campaign for Republican South Dakota Sen. John Thune:

And there was Wadhams as one-man campaign wrecking ball: When Daschle communications director Dan Pfeiffer tried to squeeze in a media hit after an election-related courthouse faceoff, Wadhams stood just off-camera bellowing "Bullshit! Bullshit!" like an outraged baseball fan cat-calling a major-league ump.

Similarly, the Post itself previously has reported that "Wadhams is politically brutal enough to be considered a Republican hitman."

The Post also failed to fully identify Mike Britt, Wadhams' successor as executive director of the Colorado Republican Party:

This month, Wadhams retained his role as Colorado Republican Party chairman in an unpaid capacity, but stepped down as executive director. Instead, Wadhams will be paid $15,000 a month to manage the campaign of Bob Schaffer against Democrat Mark Udall in Colorado's U.S. Senate race. Mike Britt, who formerly worked for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign, was named executive director.

As Colorado Media Matters has noted, a June 2007 interim report by the majority staff of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform listed Britt among White House officials, including former White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove, who "averaged more than 100 e-mails sent or received each weekday" that their RNC email accounts were active. Britt was associate director of the White House Office of Political Affairs. According to the interim report:

Mr. Rove and six other White House officials -- Mike Britt, Jonathan Felts, Korinne Kubenna, Mindy McLaughlin, Cliff Rosenberger, and Nick Sinatra -- all averaged more than 100 e-mails sent or received each weekday that their accounts were active.¹¹ In 2007, Mr. Rove frequently sent more than 100 e-mails per day through his RNC e-mail account and received more than 200 per day.

A chart included in the report indicated that among emails preserved by the RNC, Britt from February 2, 2007, through April 27, 2007, sent 3,589 emails and received 5,147 through his RNC account. Of those, 830 were sent to, and 1,218 received from "official '.gov' email accounts."

As Media Matters for America has noted, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in 2007 directed the RNC and the Bush-Cheney 2004 presidential campaign to preserve email messages to or from accounts held by White House officials, and said that as a result of several of the committee's investigations, it had "reason to believe that many e-mails related to official government business may have been deleted from the RNC's servers." The committee's majority staff also said in its interim report that "[t]he evidence obtained by the Committee indicates that White House officials used their RNC e-mail accounts in a manner that circumvented" the requirements of the Presidential Records Act.

—E.B.