WASHINGTON — All roads lead to Rove.
Well, many of them do, anyway. The Republican National Committee has sent out a list of top officials for President Bush's re-election campaign, and four of the seven come from the orbit of Karl Rove, Bush's political mastermind.
Rove so far is staying put in the White House as senior adviser to the president, but there can be little doubt who has the power at the nascent Bush-Cheney '04. Rove deputy Ken Mehlman, who has been White House political director, had earlier been named as campaign manager. Mehlman's deputy will be Kelley McCullough, an RNC official who worked for Rove both in the White House and at Rove's consulting business, Karl Rove & Co.
The senior strategist for the campaign will be Matthew Dowd, who was a Rove acolyte in the 2000 campaign and coordinates the RNC's polling. And the chief outside legal counsel will be Ben Ginsberg, a man Rove recruited to play the same role in the 2000 campaign.
Not everybody on the list was a wild Rover. Nicolle Devenish, a White House spokeswoman who becomes campaign communications director, worked in Florida and California politics previously. Thomas Josefiak, who will be general counsel, has been a longtime RNC official. And Terry Nelson, who becomes the political director, was an RNC official who served as political director for the National Republican Congressional Committee in 2000.
On the other hand, Nelson served as majority staff director of the Iowa Senate, and Iowa Senate President Mary Kramer is a confidant of Rove. But Rove, traveling with Bush in Poland on Friday, said he had no longstanding ties to Nelson, Devenish or Josefiak.