Opposition research (often referred to as oppo) is the term used to classify and describe efforts of supporters or paid consultants of a political candidate to legally investigate the biographical, legal or criminal, medical, educational, financial and public office or voting records of the opposing candidate,prior news media coverage, usually in the time period between announcement of intent to run and the actual election. Opposition research may also refer to illegal or inethical means of gathering potentially damaging information on candidates, such as accessing credit reports, wiretapping, theft of files, hacking computer files, and interviewing ex-spouses. A third type of opposition research occurs in the 'prebuttal' phase of campaign development, when a candidate's political consultants will amass files of potentially damaging information on their own clients, to prepare pre-emptive strategies for rebuttal at a later date. A fourth type of opposition research is conducted, often by the same staff who conducted campaign research, against opponents of or dissenters against the policies of an incumbent. Law prohibits the use of public office for partisan political advocacy, but often the same staff who once researched private information about opponents are placed in positions of proximity to confidential government files. OPPO Digital, Inc. ... Oppo redirects here. ... “Electioneering” redirects here. ... For other uses, see Politics (disambiguation). ... Political campaign Part of the Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Campaign finance refers to the means by which money is raised for election campaigns. ... In the past, political campaigns were conducted using traditional methods of personal contact, such as television and radio media purchasing, print advertising and direct mail. ... Political consulting is the business which has grown up around advising and assisting political campaigns, primarily in the United States. ... In politics, campaign advertising is the use of paid media (newspapers, radio, television, etc. ... Political campaign Part of the Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Canvassing is the systematic contacting of individuals in a target group, often in a particular geographic area. ... Political campaign Part of the Politics series Politics Portal This box:      An election promise is a promise made to the public by a politician who is trying to win an election. ... Get out the vote, sometimes GOTV, is a term used to describe two categories of political activity, both aimed at increasing the number of votes cast in one or more elections. ... Lawn signs placed near a polling place in the U.S., July 2004 Lawn signs are one of the most visible features of an election campaign in some countries. ... Political campaign Part of the Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Negative campaigning is having too much doodoo in your underpants. ... An attack ad in election terms is an advertisement whose message is meant as an attack against another candidate or political party. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... A push poll is a political campaign technique in which an individual or organization attempts to influence or alter the view of respondents under the guise of conducting a poll. ... Political campaign Part of the Politics series Politics Portal This box:      This page is about a political tactic. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Look up Candidate in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... In United States and other democracies, political campaigns larger than a few individuals generally include a campaign manager whose role is to coordinate the campaigns operations. ... The staff of political campaigns are the people who get paid to formulate and implement the strategy needed to win an election. ...

Origins and History

• In the First Century B.C., Cicero is said to have gathered information that was damaging to opponents and using it in attacks against them. He accused one political opponent, Cataline, of murdering one wife to make room for another. He attacked Mark Antony in speeches known as the Philippics, eventually prompting Antony to chop off his head and right hand and display them at the Roman Forum.^[1]
• Opposition research also has its origins in military planning, as evident in such ancient texts asThe Art of War, published in the Fifth Century B.C. by Sun Tzu. This manual for warriors describes the necessity for understanding an opponent's weaknesses, for using spies, and for striking in moments of weakness.
• In 18th Century England, opposition research took the form of scandalmongering pamphlet wars between the Whig and Tory parties. Writers such as Daniel Defoe, Jonathan Swift, and Henry Fielding particpated, often writing under assumed names.^[2] This tradition of robust attack was replicated later in the American colonies, when writers such as Thomas Paine or Benjamin Franklin conducted opposition research and published their results.
• The first appearance of the phrase "opposition research" in the New York Times occurred on December 17, 1971, in an article that describes the infiltration of the Edmund Muskie presidential campaign by a female Republican volunteer: "...an article appeared in a Washington newspaper describing the 'opposition research' program at Republican headquarters..."^[3]

For other uses, see Cicero (disambiguation). ... A philippic is a fiery, damning speech delivered to condemn a particular political actor. ... For other uses, see The Art of War (disambiguation). ... Sun Tzu (孫子 also commonly written in pinyin: Sūn Zǐ) was the author of The Art of War, an influential ancient Chinese book on military strategy (for the most part not dealing directly with tactics). ... Daniel Defoe (1659/1661 [?] â€“ April 24 [?], 1731)[1] was a British writer, journalist, and spy, who gained enduring fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. ... Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (November 30, 1667 – October 19, 1745) was an Irish cleric, satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for Whigs then for Tories), and poet, famous for works like Gullivers Travels, A Modest Proposal, A Journal to Stella, The Drapiers Letters, The Battle of the Books, and... Henry Fielding (April 22, 1707 – October 8, 1754) was an English novelist and dramatist known for his rich earthy humor and satirical prowess and as the author of the novel Tom Jones. ... For other persons of the same name, see Thomas Paine (disambiguation). ... Benjamin Franklin (January 17 [O.S. January 6] 1706 – April 17, 1790) was one of the most well known Founding Fathers of the United States. ...

Methods

Opposition research differs immensely depending on the size and funding of a campaign, the ethics of the candidate, and the era in which it is conducted. With the advent of computers and the internet, the practice now includes data-mining of voting records of the electorate as well as candidates. A local election sometimes has a staff member dedicated to reading through all of the public opponents' statements and their voting records; others initiate whisper campaigns that employ techniques of disinformation or "black ops" to deliberately mislead the public by advancing a pre-determined "narrative" that will present the opponent in a negative light. The staff of political campaigns are the people who get paid to formulate and implement the strategy needed to win an election. ... For other uses, see Disinformation (disambiguation). ...

A state-wide or national campaign will often have many dozens of workers doing opposition research scanning through vast amounts of information, searching through judicial records, all public statements, youthful writings. These may also include conducting interviews with people who knew the candidate, and (ideally) verifying or at least corroborating the information.

Congressional and presidential opposition research is often conducted by or funded by a political party, lobbying group, political action committee (PAC), or a 527 group that coalesces around a certain issue. In recent years the task of opposition research has been privatized in many areas. Full time companies with permanent staff specializing in media productions or "grassroots" operations have replaced volunteers and campaign officials. Look up PAC in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... A 527 group is a type of tax-exempt organization named after a section of the United States tax code, created primarily to influence the nomination, election, appointment or defeat of candidates for public office. ...

Opposition Research in U.S. Presidential Elections

• Opponents of Andrew Jackson in the 1824 and 1828 presidential elections unearthed his marriage records to imply that he was an "adulterer" for marrying Rachel Robards before she was legally divorced from her first husband. Jackson had married her in 1791 on the strength of a statement from her husband that he had divorced her; Jackson had two wedding ceremonies, the not-recognizable one of 1791 and the legally corrective one of 1794. His politican opponents used this information decades later against him, and he fought many duels over his wife's "honor." Rachel Robards died before Jackson took office in his first term; he maintained that the stress of the opposition had killed her.^[4]
• Lee Atwater is considered to the the "father" of modern agressive "oppo" techniques. Atwater, who honed his style working for for the racist South Carolina Senator Strom Thurmond, worked for the Republican National Committee in the 1988 presidential campaign,for which dozens of volunteers staffed three shifts around the clock to feed the then-burgeoning 24-hour news cycle, and crafted the now-infamous “Willie Horton” ads that are credited with turning voters away from Michael Dukakis and towards George H.W. Bush. Willie Horton was an African-American convicted felon released on a weekend furlough during Governor Dukakis’s tenure, and went on a killing rampage. Atwater is also credited with originating "push polls" and "whisper campaigns" that use disinformation strategies to alienate voters from opponents. A biography of Atwater, quotes him as saying in an interview toward the end of his life that he regretted some of his less ethical techniques^[5]

• In the 1992 presidential campaign, Republicans reported that they spent $6 million dollars on a "state of the art (opposition research) war machine" to investigate Bill Clinton, who was running against George H.W. Bush. In the same election, the Clinton campaign paid more than $100,000 to a private investigator to look into allegations about Clinton's womanizing, investigating more than two dozen women.^[6]

• In the 2000 presidential election, longtime oppositon researcher and Nixon loyalist Roger Stone was recruited by former Secretary of State James Baker to oversee the recount of the disputed Presidential election in Miami-Dade County in 2000. Stone is credited with organizing the street demonstrations and eventual shut-down of the recount in that pivotal county.^[7]
• In the 2004 presidential race, Chris Lehane, a Democratic opposition researcher attracted notoriety and built a reputation not for deploying his skills against Republican opponents, but for using them against other Democrats in the primary races. Working for retired Army general Wesley Clark, Lehane sought to establish a media "narrative" that Howard Dean was hypocritical and dishonest, based on surveys of his administsrative archive as governor of Vermont.^[8]

• A protege of Atwater's, Karl Rove, is considered to be the "architect" of George W. Bush's election to the governor's office in Texas, and to the presidency in 2000 and 2004. In the 2000 race, Rove is credited with masterminding the push poll that initiated the "John McCain has a black love child" whisper campaign in South Carolina.^[9] Anonymous telephone pollsters, upon determining that a voter was pro-McCain, asked the question, "Would you be more or less likely to vote for John McCain if you knew he had fathered a black child out of wedlock?" The question was not overt slander, but it prompted the president of Bob Jones University to launch his own internet campaign against McCain, and succeeded in crippling the trust of voters McCain had attracted. The Bush camp knew, as the general public did not, that in reality, John McCain is the adoptive father of a dark-skinned Bangladeshi refugee who was rescued by his wife Cindi.^[10]

For other uses, see Andrew Jackson (disambiguation). ... Harvey Leroy Lee Atwater (February 26, 1951 – March 29, 1991) was an American Republican political consultant and strategist. ... James Strom Thurmond (December 5, 1902 – June 26, 2003) was an American politician who served as governor of South Carolina and as a United States Senator representing that state. ... The Republican National Committee (RNC) provides national leadership for the Republican Party of the United States. ... Michael Stanley Dukakis (born November 3, 1933) is an American Democratic politician, former Governor of Massachusetts, and the Democratic presidential nominee in 1988. ... Willie Hortons mugshot on the Weekend Passes ad William R. Horton (born August 12, 1951 in Chesterfield, South Carolina) is a convicted felon who was the subject of a Massachusetts weekend furlough program that released him while serving a life sentence for murder, without the possibility of parole, providing... Order: 41st President Vice President: Dan Quayle Term of office: January 20, 1989 – January 20, 1993 Preceded by: Ronald Reagan Succeeded by: Bill Clinton Date of birth: June 12, 1924 Place of birth: Milton, Massachusetts First Lady: Barbara Pierce Bush Political party: Republican George Herbert Walker Bush, KBE (born June... Karl Christian Rove (born December 25, 1950) is Deputy Chief of Staff to President George W. Bush until the end of August 2007. ... McCain redirects here. ... Bob Jones University (BJU) is a private, Protestant Fundamentalist, liberal arts university in Greenville, South Carolina. ...

Opposition Research Conducted in the White House

• Nixon Administraton: During the Richard Nixon administration, White House staffers compiled lists of names of political opponents, journalists who had criticized Nixon, and artists and actors (such as Jane Fonda and Paul Newman) who had dissented with Nixon policy, especially on the subject of Vietnam, with the intent of prompting Internal Revenue Service investigations. The full extent of Nixon's surveillance of private citizens solely on the basis of their dissent was not known until years after Nixon was forced to resign, as former staff members such as Charles Colson and John Dean began to disclose details.^[11] Nixon's Enemies List is the informal name of what started as a list of President Richard Nixon’s major political opponents compiled by Charles Colson, written by George T. Bell [1] (assistant to Colson, special counsel to the White House) and sent in memorandum form to John Dean on September 9, 1971. The list was part of a campaign officially known as “Opponents List” and “Political Enemies Project.” The official purpose, as described by the White House Counsel’s Office, was to “screw” Nixon’s political enemies, by means of tax audits from the IRS, and by manipulating “grant availability, federal contracts, litigation, prosecution, etc.”^[12]

• Ford Administraton: During the Gerald Ford presidency, Deputy Assistant Dick Cheney suggested in a now infamous memo to Donald Rumsfeld that the White House use the Justice Department to conduct opposition research and retaliate against political opponents and critical journalists such as Seymour Hersh and the New York Times, arguing that the executive branch had the power to prosecute journalists as they saw fit, under the provisions of the Espionage Act of 1917.^[13]

• Reagan Administration: In 1984, during the Ronald Reagan presidency, the Republican National Committee formed The Opposition Research Group, with its own budget of $1.1 million. These staff amassed information on eight Democratic presidential candidates based on data from voting records, Congressional Record speeches, media clippings and transcripts, campaign materials, all of which was stored on a computer for easy access. In this way Reagan was able to track inconsistencies and attack them. This original data base evolved into a network that linked information gleaned by Republicans in all 50 states, creating a master data base accessible to high-ranking Republican staff, even aboard Air Force One.^[14]

• Clinton Administsration: During the Bill Clinton administration, the "Filegate" scandal erupted when White House staffers said to be acting on the directions of First Lady Hillary Clinton improperly accessed 500 FBI files compiled for security checks of Reagan and Bush staffers in previous administrations. Craig Livingstone, said to be hired by Mrs. Clinton with dubious credentials, resigned amid public outcry. In testimony under oath during the Kenneth Starr special prosecutor's investigation, Mrs. Clinton stated that she had neither hired Livingstone nor improperly perused the files.^[15]

• George W. Bush Administration: In 2007, Karl Rove resigned amid efforts to indict him for improperly disclosing the identity of a "classified" CIA employee whose husband had dissented with the Bush administration, and for improper mingling of partisan political behaviors with his appointed duties, such as interfering with Justice department dismissals of U.S. attorneys who were Democrats, in the Bush White House e-mail controversy.^[16]

Nixon redirects here. ... Jane Fonda (born December 21, 1937) is a two-time Academy Award-winning American actress, writer, political activist, former fashion model, and fitness guru. ... This article is about the American actor and race team owner. ... Charles (Chuck) Wendell Colson (born October 16, 1931, in Boston, Massachusetts) was the chief counsel for President Richard Nixon from 1969 to 1973 and was one of the Watergate Seven, jailed for Watergate-related charges. ... John Dean, May 7, 1972. ... Nixons enemies list was compiled by Charles Colson and sent to John Dean Nixons Enemies List is the informal name of what started as a list of President Richard Nixons major political opponents compiled by Charles Colson, written by George T. Bell [1] (assistant to Colson, special... For other persons named Gerald Ford, see Gerald Ford (disambiguation). ... Richard Bruce Dick Cheney (born January 30, 1941), is the 46th and current Vice President of the United States, serving under President George W. Bush. ... Donald Henry Rumsfeld (born July 9, 1932) is a businessman, a U.S. Republican politician, the 13th Secretary of Defense under President Gerald Ford from 1975 to 1977, and the 21st Secretary of Defense under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2006. ... The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) is a Cabinet department in the United States government designed to enforce the law and defend the interests of the United States according to the law and to ensure fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans. ... Seymour Myron Sy Hersh (born April 8, 1937 Chicago) is an American Pulitzer Prize winning investigative journalist and author based in Washington, DC. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker magazine on military and security matters. ... The New York Times is an internationally known daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed in the United States and many other nations worldwide. ... The Espionage Act of 1917 was a United States federal law passed shortly after entering World War I, on June 15, 1917, which made it a crime for a person to convey information with intent to interfere with the operation or success of the armed forces of the United States... Reagan redirects here. ... The Republican National Committee (RNC) provides national leadership for the Republican Party of the United States. ... For the current aircraft, see Boeing VC-25. ... William Jefferson Bill Clinton (born William Jefferson Blythe III[1] on August 19, 1946) was the 42nd President of the United States, serving from 1993 to 2001. ... Filegate is a White House scandal in June of 1996. ... REDIRECT Hillary Rodham Clinton   This is a redirect from a title with another method of capitalisation. ... Kenneth Winston Starr Kenneth Winston Starr (born July 21, 1946) is an American lawyer and former judge who was appointed to the Office of the Independent Counsel to investigate the death of the deputy White House counsel Vince Foster and the Whitewater land transactions by President Bill Clinton. ... The Bush White House e-mail controversy surfaced in 2007, during the controversy involving the dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys. ...

Opposition Research and Mass Media Ethics

• By the spring of 2008, Karl Rove had found a new customer for his "oppo" skills; he became a paid employee of the Fox News channel,^[17] and within weeks, that network began running looped video footage of excerpted sermons presidential hopeful Barack Obama's Chicago minister, in an effort to cripple the trust of Obama supporters. At the same time in his commentary, Rove praised John McCain for adopting Bridget, as if he were introducing the subject to the public for the first time.^[18]

Fox News Channels slogan is We Report, You Decide The Fox News Channel is a U.S. cable and satellite news channel. ...

Opposition Research and Public Opinion

The most common, populist understanding of "opposition research" is information gathered about the opposition candidate or group that's then used to create attack ads and other forms of negative campaigning or dirty tricks. And this is indeed one common use of opposition research. Much of the "opposition research" that's used for negative ads isn't legitimate research at all, but merely rumor and unverified allegations, "whisper" campaigns often used "virally" via the internet. Opposition research earned a bad reputation in political and popular circles in recent times, and much of this reputation is deserved. Like anything, opposition research can be -- and often is -- misused. But in the majority of cases (the infamous "Swift Boat" incident from the 2004 campaign being one of the most famous) what's termed "opposition research" appears to be undergoing a change in connotation, from positive to negative.^{[citation needed]} An attack ad in election terms is an advertisement whose message is meant as an attack against another candidate or political party. ... Political campaign Part of the Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Negative campaigning is having too much doodoo in your underpants. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Swift Vets and POWs for Truth, formerly known as the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (SBVT), is a political group (527 group) of American Swift boat veterans and former prisoners of war of the Vietnam War, formed during the 2004 presidential election campaign for the purpose of opposing John Kerry...

The Atwater-Rove style drew sharp scrutiny and criticism, and opened a new venue for study of executive managegment style, as scholars sought to examine to what extent incumbent politicians who used "black ops" to gain power would also deploy the same staff and techniques to maintain power and control once they are elected. The public now weighs a candidate's viability by how they conduct their campaigns, and to many voters, a negative campaign means that if elected, that candidate will possibly transfer "oppo" research into retaliatiory operations against dissenters. Polls conducted by Pew in the days after the 2004 presidential election indicated that 72% of voters perceived a dramatic increase in negative campaign tactics, and that only about 30% felt they were justified.^[19] In the race for the 2008 presidency, opinion polls seem to indicate that negative campaigns based on opposition research-based disinformation tends to backfire as voters become more sophisticated and reject the old techniques that were standard in the old South race-baiting era.^{[citation needed]}

Opposition Research and Political Infighting

• In the spring of 2007, Roger Stone, a political consultant in the employ of New York state senator Joseph Bruno, was forced to resign after leaving threatening phone messages on the answering machine of the 85-year-old father of New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, alleging that Spitzer's campaign finances were conducted improperly.^[20] In November of that same year, Stone sent a letter to the FBI detailing Spitzer's sexual preferences with prostitutes and sexual props, right down to his black calf-length socks.^[21] Stone was considered to be an authoritative source because he frequented the same prostitutes as a client himself. A subsequent Justice Deparment investigation produced evidence that ultimately led to Spitzer's resignation as governor. Joseph Bruno, Stone's client, has been a longtime political enemy of Eliot Spitzer.

Roger Stone is a Republican campaign consultant ([1]) and lobbyist from the United States. ... Joseph L. Bruno (born April 8, 1929) is an American businessman and politician, the Temporary President of the New York State Senate and its Republican-party majority leader. ...

References

See also

• American Association of Political Consultants
• Devorah Adler
• Lee Atwater
• David Bossie
• James Carville
• Barbara Comstock
• disinformation
• Scott Howell
• Chris Lehane
• October surprise
• Karl Rove
• Roger Stone

The American Association of Political Consultants is the trade group of the United States. ... Harvey Leroy Lee Atwater (February 26, 1951 – March 29, 1991) was an American Republican political consultant and strategist. ... David N. Bossie is the president of conservative non profit Citizens United. ... James Carville James Carville (born October 25, 1944) is an American political consultant, commentator, media personality and pundit. ... Barbara Comstock is a former employee of the United States Department of Justice. ... For other uses, see Disinformation (disambiguation). ... Scott Howell is one of the most influential conservative political operatives in the United States. ... An October surprise is American political jargon describing a stunning news event with the potential to influence the outcome of an election, particularly one for the presidency. ... Karl Christian Rove (born December 25, 1950) is Deputy Chief of Staff to President George W. Bush until the end of August 2007. ... Roger Stone is a Republican campaign consultant ([1]) and lobbyist from the United States. ...

External links

• The Atlantic- Playing Dirty
• [1]Digging the Dirt, BBC documentary about 2000 presidential race and Hillary Clinton senatorial race
• PoliDirt, the Opposition Research Wiki
• [2]Do-It-Yourself site for Opposition Research
• [3]American Association of Political Consultants Code of Ethics
• [4]Campaigns & Elections, political research journal