FLASHREPORT

AN INTERVIEW WITH CHRIS NORBY'S CAMPAIGN CONSULTANT JOHN LEWIS

Jon Fleischman, Publisher

THE INTERVIEW WITH JOHN LEWIS:

Flash: Congratulations John on the big win on Tuesday.  By any measure that was a huge win for your client, Supervisor Chris Norby.  What would you say made the difference?

John Lewis:  Of course everything starts with the candidate and Chris Norby has been an outstanding public servant for North Orange County for many years and has built up a huge reservoir of good will and positive name ID which gave him a huge advantage.  Another huge factor not to be underestimated is his life long residency in the City of Fullerton coupled with his over 20 years of teaching in the cities of Brea and Placentia.  You just can’t believe the stories phoners and precinct walkers would hear.  Everything from he swam in my parent pool when he was a little kid to he taught my son history at Brea-Olinda High School.  We heard those stories over and over again.

Flash: What else accounted for your surprisingly large win over you main Republican opponent Linda Ackerman?

Lewis: For openers having Congressman Tom McClintock’s endorsement was enormous.  Nearly all of the partisan office holders endorsed Linda Ackerman, but they were all trumped by Tom’s endorsement.  In this political environment of tea parties and health care protests the Tom McClintock name resonates better than any of the Republican names across the state.  Especially in a low turnout election, a McClintock endorsement is the political gold standard.  We were fortunate that Chris and Tom had a long history of collaborating on private property issues and Tom was willing to endorse out of the gate and be active in communicating with voters on behalf of Chris.  He was very much involved in voter outreach…not just a name on a list.  Tom was gracious enough to participate in a telephone town hall meeting, he recorded several GOTV calls for us and he was featured on all of our mail.

Secondly, Lewis Consulting provides polling services for our clients.  Immediately after Mike Duvall’s resignation a Lewis poll went into the field and the results gave Chris Norby the confidence to proceed with his candidacy.  Our initial poll anticipated that 75% of the votes cast would be by absentee voters and that 59% of the votes would come from Republican voters. It also gave Chris Norby a 16% lead over Linda Ackerman.  These numbers were eerily predictive.  Because of financial constraints we never polled again, yet this one poll, prior to the completion of the filing process was our blueprint for victory.

Flash: What about the nastiness of the campaign?

Lewis: This campaign was destined for ugliness from its inception.  The Ackermans were largely motivated to enter this fray by their extreme dislike of Chris Norby and that colored this entire election.  The Ackerman campaign and two independent expenditure efforts exploited a discredited and dismissed sexual harassment lawsuit against Chris Norby.  Their messaging was so negative that it lost votes for Linda Ackerman.

Flash:  This campaign will be remembered as being particularly bloody.  What happened internally in the Norby campaign in regards to the negativity?

Lewis:  Chris Norby is a person who is motivated by positive thinking and accomplishing big goals.  From the onset he refused to let the negativity get to him.  One of his ways to deal with this was to not read the mail delivered to his house.  He would just pull it out and put it in a grocery bag and give it to us to review.  Likewise, he really didn’t get involved in the review of tough mail we sent out.  He was aware of it and he approved the messaging, but he put very little mental energy in getting involved with this.  He preferred to focus his energy into what he does best...communicating with voters.  This was a great advantage to us, because Chris’ emotions never got out of whack which can often happen in a race of this nature.  He remained level headed and positive.

Flash:  What about turning points in the campaign?

Lewis:  Our direct mail consultant Chris Jones huddled with my partner Matt Holder and me and we decided we could not afford the Ackerman campaign the luxury of sending out numerous positive pieces, building up positive name ID before unleashing their viscous attacks on Chris Norby.  After their email attacks were sent to politicos, we knew the direction they would go.  Therefore, we moved up our timetable and sent out a mailer smacking the Ackerman’s pretty hard on the carpetbagging issue.  As a result they switched to their negative barrage way too early and it backfired…they could never get back to effective positive messaging on Linda.

Flash: Now that the election is over, can you share any surprising campaign stories?

Lewis: I alluded to the fact that we never did a poll during the actual campaign and as a pollster I wouldn’t recommend other campaigns replicating that strategy.  However, the back story is that we were all set to begin a two night poll when the morning of our first day of polling, Orange County GOP activist Jim Lacy publicly released a poll of Republican attitudes in the 72nd.  There was just enough information in his poll to give me the confidence to cancel our poll, freeing up additional dollars for voter contact.

Flash: As a veteran of the State Legislature for 20 years you have a lot of wisdom and experience to pass on to Chris Norby as he is likely headed to the State Assembly.  What are some of the key points you will advise him of?

Lewis: It has been 9 years since I retired from the Legislature and the culture of Sacramento has completely changed due to the full impact of term limits.  I do think that two pieces of advice I have shared with Chris are as important today as they were decades ago.  First, surround yourself with the best and the brightest.  Take your time in assembling your staff particularly in Sacramento because your staff selections are a reflection of you and they will help you soar or weigh you down.  Secondly, Sacramento has always operated on trust.  If you make a deal or give your word keep it. If a legislator gains the reputation of being untrustworthy the damage can be politically fatal.

Flash:  Any final thoughts?

Lewis:  I was very proud of the team that we assembled on short notice.  I previously mentioned Chris Jones, and we were benefited by excellent contributions from pros like Betty Presley, Phyllis Schneider, Tim Yale, Roger Yoh, Jack Dean and Jenny Henry.  We also had some volunteers who really stepped up…people like Allan Bartlett and Rich Rios, people who can and do make a difference.

Flash:  You guys scored a pretty impressive win last Tuesday.  Congratulations to you all, and thanks for taking the time to chat with me!
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Feel free to write to John Lewis or Matt Holder care of the FlashReport here, and we will pass it along.

(Full disclosure: From 1993-1996 FR Publisher Jon Fleischman was a legislative aide to then State Senator John Lewis.)