George Gorton
American political consultant
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
George Gorton (1947 – 2022) was a Republican political consultant from California, who worked on the elections of presidents, senators, governors, mayors, and international leaders in Russia, Panama, Romania, Czechoslovakia and Canada, among other places.[1][2]
George Gorton | |
|---|---|
| Born | March 30, 1947 |
| Died | May 11, 2022 (aged 75) |
| Citizenship | U.S. |
| Education | San Diego State University |
| Occupations | Political consultant, Pollster, |
| Known for |
|
Political party | Republican |
| Children | A.J. Gorton, Steven Moore |
His four-month[3] involvement in Boris Yeltsin's reelection campaign, along with his partners Joe Shumate and Dick Dresner, was the subject of a ten-page cover story in Time magazine,[4] and a major motion picture (Spinning Boris) where George, the central figure in the movie, is played by Jeff Goldblum.[5] Gorton pretended to be a flat-screen TV salesman, but was in fact helping Yeltsin's politically inexperienced daughter Tatiana Dyachenko to run Yeltsin's campaign. He was paid $250,000. Along with collaborators Richard Dresner and Joe Shumate, he leveraged Russian fears of civil war to present Yeltsin as the more stable choice.[3]
Gorton served on the national campaign teams of Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and Ronald Reagan. He managed all of Governor Pete Wilson's successful gubernatorial and US Senate races.[6] He was the first political consultant hired by Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2000 and was the chief strategist for his campaign for governor in 2003.[7][8][9]