Matt Schultz Open Record Exclusive, PART 3: Santorum Campaign Operative and Schultz’s Brother Behind the Attack on Jon Huntsman
By Samuel J Kirkwood | June 26, 2011
Rick Santorum attended a fundraiser for Matt Schultz during the 2010 campaign.
On Friday and earlier today, UTGD bloggers posted the first two portions of emails we received from an open records request sent to Secretary of State Matt Schultz’s office.
The first two batches of emails showed that Matt Schultz’s taxpayer-funded office was very interested in developments in the Republican presidential primary and also in a blog post from UTGD hypothesizing that Rick Santorum’s campaign was behind the attack on Jon Huntsman. The blog post explained how it was very possible that the attack on Huntsman came through Matt Schultz’s brother, Thomas Schultz, who is the political operative who launched the Draft Rick Santorum effort back in January 2010.
For our readers who don’t know much about the relationship between Secretary of State Matt Schultz and his brother Thomas Schultz, they are close and according to Matt, “speak regularly.” Thomas also helped run Matt’s campaign for Secretary of State.
According to a Fox News report on the Draft Santorum website launch, Thomas called Matt to get his permission to launch the site—and Matt approved. Matt was then asked about his involvement in the Draft Santorum movement and told Fox, “I have had no involvement in the creation of the site or content, nor have I involved myself in any presidential caucus campaigns. And at this point, I have not decided if I will get involved in any presidential campaigns.”
Either Matt Schultz lied to Fox News, or he just hadn’t decided yet to hand over the communications operation of the Secretary of State’s office to a Santorum political operative.
Click here to read the email exchange between the Iowa Secretary of State and his staffers and Thomas Schultz, a Santorum political operative.
On June 5, 2011 at 10:29 p.m., Thomas Schultz, brother of Secretary of State Matt Schultz, sent an email to Matt’s campaign email address with the subject line “Huntsman PR.”
Eight minutes later, Matt Schultz forwarded the email to his communication director Erin Rapp’s personal email address, to legal counsel and policy advisor Doug Struyk’s personal and official email addresses, and to his chief deputy Jim Gibbons’ official email address with the subject line, “Draft OPEC to go out tomorrow what do you think?” A word doc with the draft press release was attached to the email.
The press release that was written by Thomas Schultz on June 5th was extremely similar and in some portions verbatim to the press release sent out by the Secretary of State’s office on June 6th. We encourage you to read the original release and the draft press release written by the Santorum political operative. One of the lines that the Secretary of State’s office decided to cut, but which appears to be an accurate representation of their feelings towards Jon Huntsman’s campaign was, “Maybe you’ll learn your lesson and finally visit Iowa when you try and run for president in 2016 or 2020 because you definitely have no chance this time.”
This development that Secretary of State Matt Schultz has allowed the founder of the Draft Santorum movement to draft press releases attacking Jon Huntsman’s political campaign should alarm all Republican presidential campaigns who understand the importance of a fair and independent election monitor. The role of the Secretary of State in Iowa is to ensure election integrity, but when our Secretary of State can’t even ensure his own integrity, what can the other campaigns hope for?
There are important questions that must be answered by Matt Schultz and the Secretary of State’s office:
- Why did you allow a vocal Rick Santorum advocate to write a press release attacking Jon Huntsman for you and then release an almost identical version from your taxpayer-funded office?
- Why is Secretary of State Matt Schultz using his campaign email address to conduct official Secretary of State business?
- Why is Secretary of State Matt Schultz sending emails discussing official business to the personal email addresses of his staff in the Secretary of State’s office?
- The Secretary of State’s office was asked by The Gazette’s lead political reporter James Lynch about the anti-Huntsman press release in this email we received from the open records request. Did Secretary of State Schultz inform Lynch that the press release was written almost entirely by a Santorum political operative?
- Does Secretary of State Schultz have any comments to make about the ethics complaint filed against him by the Iowa Democratic Party for his use of public resources for the political purpose of attacking Huntsman’s campaign?
The Santorum campaign also has important questions that must be answered:
- Has the campaign ever made any payments to Thomas Schultz or any entity he’s associated with?
- Did the campaign have advanced notice about the anti-Huntsman press release being released through the Iowa Secretary of State’s office which was written by a Santorum political operative?
- DraftRickSantorum.com is now redirecting to RickSantorum.com. Have there been any discussions between anyone on the Rick Santorum campaign and Thomas Schultz about efforts to direct traffic from Thomas’ original website to the new campaign website?
1 Comment
Jerry on June 27, 2011 at 1:18 pm.
You are confusing me. Why is the Iowa SoS an “independent election monitor” with regard to a political party’s caucus or their straw poll? Does he monitor the Register’s state fair poll, too?
I agree Schultz should not taunt candidates who leave Iowa out of their campaign plans. And whatever he does should not be part of his office work.
But I don’t agree that he has some special role in running the Republican straw poll or 2012 caucus that he has violated, or that this Huntsman bashing means he can’t run a fair election when he really is in charge of one. His judgment isn’t looking too good, however, and that’s always relevant.