Jim Messina

Messina grew up in Boise, Idaho, and attended high school there. He met a University of Montana recruiter at a college fair and, learning that the university’s journalism school had a good reputation, decided to enroll without visiting the campus; he later called it the single best decision of his life. He attended the University of Montana from 1988 to 1993, studying journalism and political science, and earned his bachelor’s degree in 1993.⁠[1][1][1][2][3][4]

At university he joined the College Democrats, and as a junior he won an internship at the 1991 Montana Legislature, working as an aide to three Democratic lawmakers, then worked for the state Democratic Party on the 1992 legislative campaigns. After graduating, he helped Missoula Mayor Dan Kemmis win reelection in 1993 and in 1994 served as the state Democratic Party’s coordinator for legislative races.⁠[1][1][1][1]

In 1995, Messina joined the Washington office of Montana Democratic Senator Max Baucus as an assistant to the chief of staff; Baucus became the foundation of his career for the next dozen years, and he worked on Baucus’s 1996 and 2002 reelection campaigns. In addition, before becoming Baucus’s chief of staff, he had served as chief of staff to North Dakota Senator Byron Dorgan and New York Representative Carolyn McCarthy.⁠[1][1][2]

During Baucus’s 2002 reelection campaign, an ad targeting his opponent Mike Taylor used footage from an old advertisement for Taylor’s hair salon business showing him applying lotion to a man’s face, and was criticized as carrying a homophobic implication; Taylor then dropped out of the race and Baucus won. Messina and Baucus both denied any link to the ad at the time, but in a 2012 Bloomberg Businessweek profile Baucus recalled that Messina had shown him the ad in a motel and said, “I loved it!” The matter drew renewed attention when the British Conservatives hired Messina in 2013.⁠[5][5][5][5][5][5][5][5][5][5]

In early 2005, Messina became Baucus’s chief of staff. At the same time, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid chose Baucus to lead the fight against President George W. Bush’s plan to privatize Social Security, and Messina ran the ground war: he kept the message to two points, that the plan would cut benefits and explode the national debt, enlisted sympathetic groups to criticize the proposal and targeted Republican members of Congress who might oppose it. He recalled that in December 2004 people thought Bush would succeed, and by May 2005 the plan was dead.⁠[1][1][1][1][1][1]

During the 110th Congress he was still chief of staff in Senator Baucus’s office; he served as Baucus’s senior adviser and chief of staff while Baucus chaired the Senate Finance Committee.⁠[6][6][7]

Messina worked on Montana Democrat Jon Tester’s 2006 US Senate campaign; he said that by the end of the campaign an average Montana television viewer was seeing pro-Tester ads twenty times a week.⁠[8][8]

In June 2008, Messina joined Barack Obama’s presidential campaign as national chief of staff, coordinating field operations and political policy; campaign manager David Plouffe put him in charge of day-to-day operations. He controlled campaign spending, saying “everything’s gotta go through me to get spent,” and after fundraising surged in September he added tens of millions of dollars to the media and mail budgets. He also led the research team on Republican John McCain’s potential running mates.⁠[9][1][9][9][8][1]

After Obama won, Messina served as director of personnel for the Obama-Biden transition. On November 15, while watching the Montana–Idaho State football game in Missoula, he received a call from Obama offering him the job of White House deputy chief of staff.⁠[2][1]

From January 2009, Messina served as White House deputy chief of staff, reporting to Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and overseeing departments including legislative affairs, political affairs, personnel, scheduling and advance; he called himself “the operational guy,” whose job was to make sure the administration reached its goals and consistently moved the president’s message to the people.⁠[2][1][1][1][1][1]

In the White House he was the administration’s top liaison to progressive groups and worked on the Affordable Care Act, the economic stimulus act and the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”; the firm he founded says he was integral to passing this legislation, earning him the nickname “The Fixer.”⁠[9][10][7]

In January 2011, the White House announced a new round of staff changes: Deputy Chief of Staff Messina was leaving for Chicago to manage Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign, and the portfolio of new Deputy Chief of Staff Alyssa Mastromonaco would, like his, be political in focus.⁠[11][11]

In March 2011, the progressive magazine The Nation published an article collecting criticism of Messina’s White House approach from progressive and gay rights groups: during the health care fight he was accused of stifling outside groups’ pressure on Baucus’s version of the bill and of spearheading the deals with doctors, hospitals and drug companies; on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” a gay rights group leader was said to have been rebuked by him, and critics argued that the White House was reluctant to make repeal a legislative priority. Democratic Party spokesman Hari Sevugan countered that Messina rallied progressives behind the president’s agenda and played a critical role in achieving goals including health care reform and the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”⁠[9][9][9][9][9][9]

Messina was campaign manager of Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign, which ended in Obama’s victory. The firm he founded says the campaign fused technology and politics and established the blueprint for the modern presidential campaign, and former Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt called it “the best-run campaign ever.”⁠[10][10]

Obama announced the relaunch of his remaining campaign apparatus as a tax-exempt group, Organizing for Action, to mobilize support for important legislation in his second term, with Messina as national chairman; the group was separate from the Democratic National Committee, and its board also included Obama campaign and White House alumni such as Stephanie Cutter and Robert Gibbs. Messina said he would be deeply involved in the organization, working on issues such as immigration reform, climate change, balanced deficit reduction and reducing gun violence.⁠[12][12][12][12][12][12]

In February 2013, Messina and two former campaign staffers founded the strategic consulting firm The Messina Group (TMG) in Washington, D.C., starting with three people; the firm applies data-driven campaign strategies for corporate, advocacy and political clients. On May 18 of that year, he gave the commencement address at his alma mater, the University of Montana.⁠[10][13][3]

Britain’s governing Conservatives hired Messina to advise them ahead of the 2015 general election. He said he had long admired Prime Minister David Cameron and would offer strategic campaign advice, but would not move to London or manage day-to-day political operations; he would advise Conservative chiefs and campaign strategist Lynton Crosby while continuing to run Organizing for Action.⁠[14][15][14][15]

Priorities USA Action, a Democratic-aligned super PAC, announced its leadership for the 2016 election cycle, with Messina and former Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm as co-chairs. Messina said the group had helped elect a Democratic president in 2012 and intended to play the same role again in 2016.⁠[16][16][16][16]

In the May 2015 UK general election, David Cameron’s Conservatives defeated Ed Miliband’s Labour; Labour had hired another Obama veteran, David Axelrod, as an adviser. On election night Messina was in the UK with Lynton Crosby monitoring returns. Republican consultant Stuart Stevens argued that it made no sense to credit the Conservative win to Messina or blame Labour’s loss on Axelrod, since Cameron was the stronger candidate and the economy was good.⁠[17][17][17][17][17][17]

In 2016, Italy’s Democratic Party hired Messina to advise the “yes” campaign in the constitutional reform referendum championed by Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, paying him 400,000 euros, a fee confirmed by the treasurer of the party’s group in the Chamber of Deputies. The referendum suffered a resounding defeat in December, and Renzi offered his resignation.⁠[18][18][19]

That year, TMG ran digital strategy for the reelection campaign of Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy; Messina’s side says the team helped Rajoy win a surprising reelection margin.⁠[13][4]

In Theresa May’s snap 2017 UK general election, Messina produced election modeling for Conservative headquarters. The Conservatives lost their majority in the House of Commons, and the election produced a hung parliament. May’s former chief of staff Nick Timothy later wrote that a late projection based on ground data and Messina’s modeling suggested the Conservatives would win 371 seats and a majority of 92; people familiar with Messina’s work countered that his last projection, made a week earlier, pointed to 304 seats, 22 short of a majority. Just over a week before the vote, Messina had mocked on X a YouGov poll forecasting a hung parliament.⁠[20][20][21][20][20][22][22][22][22][22]

The election study The British General Election of 2017, published in 2018, concluded that Messina’s modeling was wide of the mark in the final stretch: a week before polling day, his analysis had Labour falling to 207 seats and the Conservatives winning 371.⁠[21][21]

TMG announced that it had opened an office in San Francisco and merged with the Silicon Valley public relations firm Greenbrier to serve technology and start-up clients; Messina also promoted Tara Corrigan to chief operating officer and Mark Medish to president.⁠[13][13]

TMG was renamed Fortius Global, with Messina remaining CEO and setting the vision and strategy for the firm and its companies; its political campaign work was spun out into a wholly owned subsidiary, MCM², named after the last names of Messina and three other principals. Messina said the firm was built to carry forward the innovation and culture of the 2012 Obama reelection campaign.⁠[23][24][23][23]

Besides the UK Conservatives, Italy’s Democratic Party and Spain’s Rajoy campaign, the leaders Messina’s firm says it has served include Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto and Argentine President Mauricio Macri; in the United States, he continues to advise Democratic organizations.⁠[25][4][4]

As of October 2026, Messina is a director of the cryptocurrency company Blockchain.com; his public biography also lists board seats at Fortera, Vectra.ai, LanzaTech, the United States Soccer Foundation and the Montana Land Reliance.⁠[7][7]

X: Public account: https://x.com/Messina2012 (opens in a new window)⁠[17][26]

LinkedInLinkedInLinkedIn is a social networking platform for professionals. It was founded in 2002 by Reid Hoffman and others, launched in 2003, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2011; after Microsoft acquired it for approximately $26.2 billion in 2016, it became a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary. Its revenue comes from membership subscriptions, advertising, and recruitment solutions.Open the full entry: Public profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jim-messina (opens in a new window)⁠[26]

Fortius Global: Official website: https://fortiusglobal.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[23]