Steve Schmidt, public affairs strategist and political commentator, joins NLP board

Steve Schmidt, who held top positions in two Republican presidential campaigns and serves as a political analyst on MSNBC, has joined the News Literacy Project’s board.

“Steve brings distinctive experience and expertise to the NLP board,” board chairman Greg McCaffery said. “His impressive skills as a public affairs and political strategist will serve us well as we seek to create the next generation of informed and engaged citizens.”

Schmidt is vice chairman for public affairs at Edelman, the world’s largest public relations agency. Topics on which he has provided counsel include telecommunications, technology, financial services, energy, health care, entertainment and gaming.

He was a top strategist on President George W. Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign and served in the Bush administration as a deputy assistant to the president and counselor to the vice president. He also played a leading role in the Supreme Court confirmations of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, directing strategic communications for the Roberts nomination and heading the nomination team for Alito.

In 2006, Schmidt left the White House to run the successful re-election campaign of California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. In 2007, he served as a senior adviser to Arizona Sen. John McCain’s bid for the Republican presidential nomination; once McCain secured the nomination in 2008, Schmidt ran the day-to-day operations for his presidential campaign.

Schmidt is the fourth highly accomplished individual to join NLP’s board in the last year. The others are David M. Marchick, managing partner at The Carlyle Group; Karen Wickre, a digital media pioneer who held senior communications positions at Twitter and Google for nearly 15 years; and Eva Haller, a respected nonprofit leader and philanthropist. Board members serve renewable three-year terms.