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NRCC Fills Its Vacancies After May Shake-up

The National Republican Congressional Committee has brought on a new finance director and deputy executive director to replace two staffers who resigned last month.

Tara Snow, formerly a vice president for the Lower Manhattan Development Corp., will take over as finance director, and current Deputy Political Director Scott Douglas will be promoted to deputy executive director. Jonathan Poe has also been named national field director.

“We are getting our team in place and preparing for a very successful 2004,” NRCC’s Communications Director Carl Forti said about the changes.

Snow replaces Joe Rachinsky, who left the committee in mid-May. Rachinsky has since been brought on as a consultant to the committee and is helping raise money for the 2004 Republican National Convention, according to GOP sources.

Since February 2002, Snow has been working for the agency charged with re-imagining and reconstructing the World Trade Center site destroyed by the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Prior to her work with the Lower Manhattan Development Corp., Snow was a top adviser to New York Gov. George Pataki (R). Pataki and current National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Tom Reynolds (N.Y.), who like the governor is a former state legislator, are close confidants.

“I have worked with her in the past and I know that she will bring the same dedication to the NRCC that she demonstrated in New York,” Reynolds said.

Financially, the NRCC is on strong footing.

In the first four months of 2003, the committee raised $31 million, a total that does not include the $14 million it took in at the joint House-Senate dinner with President Bush on May 21. The National Republican Senatorial Committee will reap $8 million from that dinner.

The NRCC had spent nearly $30 million in that time, leaving it with only $1.4 million on hand. But the committee did retire the $5 million debt that it carried from the last election.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee raised $8.9 million through May and had $5.9 million on hand. The DCCC was still $6 million in arrears, however.

Unlike Snow, both Douglas and Poe are old hands at the NRCC.

Douglas will replace Donna Anderson as second-in-command to Sally Vastola, the committee’s executive director. Anderson resigned in May after 18 years with the committee, in a variety of roles.

In the 2000 cycle, Douglas held the same post prior to being pulled onto the Bush presidential campaign as a regional director. Douglas has also worked in Kentucky as a field representative for Sen. Mitch McConnell (R) and political director of Sen. Jim Bunning’s (R-Ky.) successful 1998 race.

Poe was an NRCC field representative during the 2002 cycle. He managed the 2000 campaign of Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) who came from more than 20 points behind to win an Democratic-leaning open seat.

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Valentine Belue

Update: 2024-08-23