Meet Gov. Scott Walker’s New Political Hit Women

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Silverstein wrote, “it's quite clear that the Pentagon views it as a propaganda program." 

Neither Webster nor others involved were charged with any crime, however, even though watchdog groups like CMD notedhow the so-called “surrogate operation” violated longstanding federal appropriations rules and other laws against military propaganda in the United States.

As Recall Heats Up, Walker Beefs Up Campaign Staff

In late 2011, as Wisconsin activists went door-to-door gathering signatures to recall their governor, Walker hirednew campaign staff, including Ciara Matthews as communication director.

Matthews most recently worked as communications director for the anti-abortion Susan B Anthony (SBA) List, a group that works to elect pro-life politicians and takes credit for the U.S. House of Representatives voting in 2011 to defund Planned Parenthood. It is currently asking that presidential candidates sign a pledge to appoint anti-abortion nominees to the Supreme Court, the Department of Justice and Department of Health, as well as defundPlanned Parenthood.

When the effort to defund Planned Parenthood failed in the Senate, Matthews appeared on ABC News to praise the states passing laws that cut Planned Parenthood funding. "What the states are doing is what the federal government has failed to do, and that is to strip tax dollars from America's abortion giant," she said. Possibly foreshadowing yesterday’s announcement by the Susan K. Komen for the Cure Foundation, Matthews told ABC in July 2011 that “[t]here is a huge tidal wave of support sweeping across the country right now to defund Planned Parenthood.”

In her position with SBA List, Matthews also blogged for Lifenews, discussingthe “radical pro-abort agenda of Emily's List” and penning storieslike “Obama Repeatedly Chooses Planned Parenthood Over People” and arguing that, if Planned Parenthood had its way, Steve Jobs would never have been born.

Before working with SBA List, Matthews was spokeswoman for Sharon Angle's 2010 senate campaign in Nevada. In that campaign, Angle attacked Democratic incumbent Harry Reid by running adsjuxtaposing white families and schoolchildren with menacing Latino men stalking through train yards or creeping through the night. The ads warned, “illegals [are] sneaking across our border putting Americans’ safety and jobs at risk,” and called Reid “the best friend an illegal alien ever had.”

The images and content were so offensive that even the chairwoman of the Nevada Republican Hispanic Caucus, who had also served as a spokeswoman for Angle, denouncedthe ads. Matthews, though, aggressively defendedAngle's racially tinged campaign.

Matthews also played a role in banningtwo news agencies from the candidate's election night party as “punishment” for asking questions without permission. Throughout her campaign Angle had developed a reputation for avoidingand even fleeing the news media. In the final weeks of the campaign, Nevada's CBS and NBC affiliates approachedAngle to ask about national security policy and a local air force base, and after several evasive answers, Angle said “I'll answer those questions when I'm the senator.” Matthews later informedthe news agencies that they were uninvited from Angle's election party the following week, telling the NBC affiliate's news director that his staff asking tough questions was tantamount to treating the candidate like Paris Hilton.

Matthews has pulled no punches since joining Walker's campaign in December and moving to Wisconsin. She calledthe first Democrat who announced plans to run against Walker a two-time loser who was “hand-picked by big-government, public employee union bosses.” She saidthat “whoever winds up to be the Democratic candidate is going to be someone whose interests lie with big government employee unions, and they will be beholden to the people who put them in office,” brushing aside concerns that Walker might also be beholden to the deep-pocketed, out-of-state donors who've helped him raiseover $12 million to fight the recall effort.