Gordon Hensley's Detailed Professional Background, Communications Philosophy and Timeline
With twenty-four years of political, government and private-sector communications experience in Washington D.C. and on the ground in over a dozen states, Gordon Hensley ranks among the GOP’s most experienced, versatile and resourceful behind the scenes communications professionals. His senior level communications background is unusually diverse in that he has served at different times as communications director, senior speechwriter, primary on-the-record/on-camera spokesperson, or a combination thereof on Capitol Hill, statewide and presidential campaigns, a governors office, and in corporate settings.
Hensley’s lengthy track record in various endeavors in and outside of Washington combined with his cumulative experience in four key specialized communications disciplines – communications strategy, writing, management and front line spokesperson -- adds a discernible qualitative edge to his actionable counsel and work product. In addition to having a hands on working knowledge of many of the nation's key media markets, he is equally at home as a late-cycle senior strategist in high-stakes campaigns like the 2006 Corker-Ford Tennessee Senate race; serving as senior writer on a complex international business-related copywriting project for the City of New York; preparing substantive congressional testimony and opinion editorials for federal and state health care clients; counseling incumbent U.S. Senators about packaging and marketing their legislative record; or working with SC Senator Strom Thurmond, LA Governor Buddy Roemer, CEO's and others on major speeches.
Gordon Hensley’s first-hand understanding of news management, offensive communications techniques, and why certain media strategies will work while others will fail, sets his skill level apart from the institutionalized mediocrity that pervades the Washington and New York public relations landscape. A multi-year stint on Capitol Hill, the White House, a PR firm, government agency, major corporation or elsewhere are all outstanding experiences -- but Hensley believes there is no replacement for developing media skills, savvy and survival skills in a variety of challenging settings inside and outside the Beltway, particularly in high-stakes Senate, gubernatorial and presidential primary campaigns. He also prefers working with experienced professionals who started at the bottom and earned their way up, and those who always seek out the most competitive races and environments.
And Hensley started right at the very bottom, in 1980, when he left George Washington University (GWU) and an internship at the RNC in hope of securing any job possible on Ronald Reagan’s presidential campaign. He hitchhiked to New Hampshire and showed up at Reagan headquarters in Manchester, NH. Hensley eventually secured a $40 per week gig as ‘town chairman coordinator’ – a glorified title for driving signs around the state, and keeping local supporters supplied with materials. Regardless, Hensley was hooked on campaigns, and put him on course to eventually compete in the statewide and presidential campaign arena.
Hensley returned to GWU, volunteered for various local GOP campaigns, and went on to serve for over a decade as a press secretary and speechwriter on Capitol Hill and various statewide and presidential campaigns. His first big break occurred in 1984 when GOP NY-20 (Westchester County) U.S. House candidate Joe DioGuardi won his race by less that 1% in this Democratic-leaning district in the Reagan re-elect landslide. DioGuardi asked Hensley, serving in his first campaign press secretary job, to be his Capitol Hill press secretary.
He then served as DioGuardi’s 1986 re-elect communications director against former NYC Rep. Bella Abzug, who moved to Westchester County expressly to knock off DioGuardi. She was soundly trounced. With GOP consulting icon Roger Ailes as DioGuardi’s media consultant for both the ’84 and ’86 campaigns, Hensley attended many sessions at Ailes Communications’ infamous W. 43rd St offices – a sunken living room where he would videotape and bluntly critique clients’ stump speeches and reporter Q and A sessions. It was during those two years, and in those sessions, that Hensley learned the art of campaign communications and the power of words and language.
He moved on to work for U.S. Rep. James Courter (R-NJ); U.S. Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX), GOP presidential candidate Pete du Pont (New Hampshire press secretary) in Manchester NH; New Jersey Senatorial candidate Pete Dawkins (speechwriter) in W. Long Branch NJ; Texas gubernatorial candidate Clayton Williams (senior spokesman and speechwriter) in Austin TX, and communications director and speechwriter for Louisiana GOP Governor Buddy Roemer, in Baton Rouge, LA. Hensley then served as national state media director for the Bush/Quayle ‘92 re-elect, where he managed all regional press secretaries and Cabinet-level campaign surrogate activities.
Hensley then traveled to Russia and the Ukraine for several months under the auspices of the International Republican Institute (IRI) to help teach U.S. campaign techniques. While reflecting further in Russia on the failure of the Bush campaign to have a concise rationale and message, he saw a need for campaigns to more optimally integrate paid and earned media with candidates’ daily stump message. He decided to start a campaign consulting business with a simple, generic name, Strategic Media, Inc. (SMI), to do just that. Seventeen years later, this essentially remains the SMI mission statement and is equally applicable to health care providers and other clients who are obliged to not just have a rationale when seeking federal and state funding, but also be effective in conveying a value proposition.
Founded in 1993, in Georgetown, SMI’s initial small roster of clients consisted of the Senate Republican Conference; U.S. Rep. Helen Bentley (R-MD), running for Governor; Chattanooga developer Bob Corker, running for the U.S. Senate in Tennessee; a small Wall Street brokerage firm; and George Pataki, running in New York State for Governor against Mario Cuomo. After the significant Pataki victory, Hensley worked for the Pataki Transition Committee in NYC and in Sacramento, CA as a communications consultant for California Assembly Minority Leader Jim Brulte (R-Rancho Cucamonga), during his lengthy Speaker battle against Willie Brown.
1995-’97 – For his work during the Pataki campaign, Sen. Al D’Amato (R-NY) hired Hensley to serve as communications director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC). Hensley put SMI on hold after just one cycle. From 1995 through early 1997, he served as the senior NRSC spokesman and writer, and was responsible for all aspects of the Committee's national and state media press strategy for 34 U.S. Senate races. Among his NRSC specialties was working with incumbent Senators’ offices to package legislative achievements and re-tool press operations of vulnerable incumbents. Concurrent with his NRSC duties, Hensley also worked as a communications consultant for Bob Dole’s ’96 GOP Pres Primary campaign against Lamar Alexander and Steve Forbes. He stayed with the Dole primary campaign through Iowa, New Hampshire and until Alexander and Forbes were knocked out. Later in ’96, back at the NRSC, Hensley was privileged to have the opportunity to work directly with South Carolina Senator Strom Thurmond on his final campaign announcement speech, and also spent several months on the ground in Oregon to help elect U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith.
It was then that Hensley, who has always preferred limited public visibility, was becoming more recognized for his expertise in aggressive news management tactics, operations and strategy – and was cited by the Capitol Hill newspaper, Roll Call, as one of its “Fabulous Fifty” most influential on Capitol Hill. In addition to being invited to make several appearances as a guest lecturer on campaigns and politics at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, he also appeared on various National Press Club campaign newsmaker panels and on CNN, Fox and other political programming in Washington and at the state level.
1997 Post-NRSC -- Hensley resurrected SMI, hired several staff, moved to larger space in Georgetown, and lined up as clients the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), U.S. Rep. Vito Fossella’s (NY-13) ’97 special election to succeed Rep. Susan Molinari, the Paul Coverdell (R-GA) ’98 Senate re-elect campaign, the New York State GOP, the ’98 D’Amato Senate re-elect, the Pataki ’98 gubernatorial re-elect, and the Republican Leadership Council (RLC).
2000 – After sixteen straight years of campaign or Capitol Hill work, Gordon Hensley decided to make a significant transition to 100% non-political, non-partisan work, and SMI began taking on strategic communications and writing projects through large PR firms. Health care in general – and skilled nursing providers’ federal and state Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement campaigns in particular -- became a predominant business focus.
2006 -- SMI took on a campaign for the first time in eight years, and Hensley served as senior communications advisor for Tennessee Senator Bob Corker’s 2006 Senate race against Rep. Harold Ford – among the only winners of the 2006 GOP election wipeout. Hensley was credited with helping to successfully re-tool the communications operation during the last two months of a raucous, nationally watched campaign. In 2008, Hensley took on U.S. Rep. David Dreier (R-CA) as a client and, in 2009, with the growth of various coalitions devoted to impacting federal and state health care legislation, Hensley Health Strategies, LLC was established to facilitate vendor management on larger efforts involving paid media. In 2010, SMI created paid media content for an IE effort directed towards U.S. Senate races. For 2011 and 2012, SMI will continue to collaborate with PR firms, state and federal health care clients, private clients for whom Hensley writes, and will be involved in several campaigns to be announced in the coming months.
Gordon Hensley, originally from Brooklyn NY, attended Milton Academy in Milton, MA and George Washington University in Washington, D.C. He lives in Alexandria, VA and Paris, VA with Carole Goeas and their daughter, Peyton Hensley.
History