Robert Gibbs
Encyclopedia
Robert Lane Gibbs was the 28th White House Press Secretary
White House Press Secretary
The White House Press Secretary is a senior White House official whose primary responsibility is to act as spokesperson for the government administration....

. Gibbs was the communications director for then-U.S. Senator Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...

 and Obama's 2008 presidential campaign
Barack Obama presidential campaign, 2008
Barack Obama, then junior United States Senator from Illinois, announced his candidacy for the presidency of the United States in Springfield, Illinois, on February 10, 2007. On August 27, 2008, he was declared nominee of the Democratic Party for the 2008 presidential election...

. Gibbs, who has worked with Obama since 2004, was press secretary of John Kerry
John Kerry
John Forbes Kerry is the senior United States Senator from Massachusetts, the 10th most senior U.S. Senator and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party in the 2004 presidential election, but lost to former President George W...

's 2004 presidential campaign
John Kerry presidential campaign, 2004
The Presidential Campaign of John Kerry, U.S. Senator from Massachusetts and the nominee of the Democratic Party challenged Republican incumbent President George W. Bush in the U.S. presidential election on November 2, 2004. Ultimately, Kerry conceded defeat in the race in a telephone call to Bush...

 and has previously specialized in Senate campaigns, having served as communications director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee
Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee is the Democratic Hill committee for the United States Senate. It is the only organization solely dedicated to electing Democrats to the United States Senate. The DSCC's current chair is Sen. Patty Murray, who succeeded Sen. Robert Menendez following...

 and for four individual Senate campaigns, including those of Obama in 2004 and Fritz Hollings in 1998. Gibbs was also the press secretary of Representative Bob Etheridge
Bob Etheridge
Bobby Ray "Bob" Etheridge is the former U.S. Representative for , serving from 1997 until 2011. He is a member of the Democratic Party. He was defeated in the 2010 election by Renee Ellmers.-Early life, education and career:...

. On November 22, 2008, Gibbs was announced as the press secretary of the Obama administration. He assumed the role of press secretary on January 20, 2009, and gave his first official briefing on January 22.

On January 5, 2011, Gibbs announced that he would leave the White House to become an outside advisor to the administration. He left on February 11, 2011.

Early life and education

Gibbs was born in Auburn, Alabama
Auburn, Alabama
Auburn is a city in Lee County, Alabama, United States. It is the largest city in eastern Alabama with a 2010 population of 53,380. It is a principal city of the Auburn-Opelika Metropolitan Area...

. His parents, Nancy and Robert Coleman Gibbs, worked in the Auburn University
Auburn University
Auburn University is a public university located in Auburn, Alabama, United States. With more than 25,000 students and 1,200 faculty members, it is one of the largest universities in the state. Auburn was chartered on February 7, 1856, as the East Alabama Male College, a private liberal arts...

 library system and involved their son in politics at an early age. Nancy Gibbs would take Robert, then known as "Bobby," to local League of Women Voters
League of Women Voters
The League of Women Voters is an American political organization founded in 1920 by Carrie Chapman Catt during the last meeting of the National American Woman Suffrage Association approximately six months before the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution gave women the right to vote...

 meetings rather than hire a babysitter, and involved him in "voter re-identification" work at the county courthouse. Gibbs attended Auburn City Schools
Auburn City Schools
The Auburn City School District or Auburn City Schools is the school district of Auburn, Alabama. The superintendent is J. Terry Jenkins.-Early history of Auburn schools:...

 and Auburn High School. At Auburn High, Gibbs played saxophone
Saxophone
The saxophone is a conical-bore transposing musical instrument that is a member of the woodwind family. Saxophones are usually made of brass and played with a single-reed mouthpiece similar to that of the clarinet. The saxophone was invented by the Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax in 1846...

 in the Auburn High School Band, was a goalkeeper on the Tigers' soccer team, and participated in the school's debate squad. Gibbs graduated from Auburn High in 1989, in the same class as novelist Ace Atkins
Ace Atkins
Ace Atkins is an American journalist and author. Atkins worked as a crime reporter in the newsroom of The Tampa Tribune before he published his first novel, Crossroad Blues, in 1998...

, LEGO
Lego
Lego is a line of construction toys manufactured by the Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. The company's flagship product, Lego, consists of colorful interlocking plastic bricks and an accompanying array of gears, minifigures and various other parts...

 artist Eric Harshbarger
Eric harshbarger
Eric Harshbarger is a puzzle designer and well-known builder of large scale LEGO mosaics and sculptures. From around 2000 to 2006 he has been commissioned to build for television shows, magazines and other companies for promotional purposes...

, and the Chief Hospitalist at Valley Medical Center, Dr. Michael Mena.

Gibbs went on to attend the North Carolina State University
North Carolina State University
North Carolina State University at Raleigh is a public, coeducational, extensive research university located in Raleigh, North Carolina, United States. Commonly known as NC State, the university is part of the University of North Carolina system and is a land, sea, and space grant institution...

, serving as goalkeeper for the North Carolina State Wolfpack soccer team from 1990 to 1992. Gibbs graduated from North Carolina State cum laude with a B.A.
Bachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...

 in political science
Political science
Political Science is a social science discipline concerned with the study of the state, government and politics. Aristotle defined it as the study of the state. It deals extensively with the theory and practice of politics, and the analysis of political systems and political behavior...

 in 1993.

Career

While a student at North Carolina State in 1991, Gibbs became an intern for Alabama's 3rd congressional district
Alabama's 3rd congressional district
Alabama's 3rd congressional district is a U.S. congressional district in Alabama, which elects a representative to the United States House of Representatives. It encompasses Calhoun, Chambers, Cherokee, Clay, Cleburne, Lee, Macon, Randolph, Russell, Talladega, and Tallapoosa counties...

 Congressman Glen Browder
Glen Browder
John Glen Browder is a former member of the United States House of Representatives from Alabama's 3rd congressional district. Browder was born in Sumter, South Carolina and graduated from Edmunds High School in 1961. He attended Presbyterian College, receiving a B.A. in history in 1965. He went on...

. Gibbs quickly rose through the ranks of Browder's staff, rising to become the representative's executive assistant in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

 Gibbs returned to Alabama in 1996 to work on Browder's unsuccessful Senate campaign that year
United States Senate election in Alabama, 1996
The 1996 United States Senate election in Alabama was held on November 5, 1996. Incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator Howell Heflin decided to retire. Republican Jeff Sessions won the open seat, becoming just the second Republican U.S...

. In 1997, Gibbs was press secretary for Congressman Bob Etheridge
Bob Etheridge
Bobby Ray "Bob" Etheridge is the former U.S. Representative for , serving from 1997 until 2011. He is a member of the Democratic Party. He was defeated in the 2010 election by Renee Ellmers.-Early life, education and career:...

 of North Carolina and, in 1998, was spokesman for Senator Fritz Hollings' successful re-election campaign
United States Senate election in South Carolina, 1998
The 1998 United States Senate election in South Carolina was held on November 3, 1998. Incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator Fritz Hollings won re-election.-Candidates:*Stephen Brown, Greenville County GOP Chairman*Bob Inglis, U.S. Congressman from the 4th CD...

. Gibbs worked in the campaigns of two other senators and served as communications director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, before taking the position of press secretary of John Kerry
John Kerry
John Forbes Kerry is the senior United States Senator from Massachusetts, the 10th most senior U.S. Senator and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party in the 2004 presidential election, but lost to former President George W...

's 2004 presidential campaign
John Kerry presidential campaign, 2004
The Presidential Campaign of John Kerry, U.S. Senator from Massachusetts and the nominee of the Democratic Party challenged Republican incumbent President George W. Bush in the U.S. presidential election on November 2, 2004. Ultimately, Kerry conceded defeat in the race in a telephone call to Bush...

.

U.S. presidential election, 2004

Early in the 2004 presidential campaign, Gibbs was the press secretary of Democratic
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

 candidate Senator
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...

 John Kerry
John Kerry
John Forbes Kerry is the senior United States Senator from Massachusetts, the 10th most senior U.S. Senator and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party in the 2004 presidential election, but lost to former President George W...

. On November 11, 2003, Gibbs resigned "in reaction to the firing of Jim Jordan, abruptly let go by Kerry Sunday night." Gibbs was replaced by Stephanie Cutter
Stephanie Cutter
Stephanie Cutter is a Democratic Party operative. She serves as Deputy Senior Advisor to President Barack Obama.- Biography :Cutter was born in Taunton, Massachusetts and raised in nearby Raynham, Massachusetts...

, a former spokeswoman for Ted Kennedy
Ted Kennedy
Edward Moore "Ted" Kennedy was a United States Senator from Massachusetts and a member of the Democratic Party. Serving almost 47 years, he was the second most senior member of the Senate when he died and is the fourth-longest-serving senator in United States history...

. After leaving the Kerry campaign, Gibbs became spokesman for a 527
527 group
A 527 organization or 527 group is a type of American tax-exempt organization named after "Section 527" of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code...

 political group formed to stop the 2004 presidential campaign of Howard Dean
Howard Dean
Howard Brush Dean III is an American politician and physician from Vermont. He served six terms as the 79th Governor of Vermont and ran unsuccessfully for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination. He was chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 2005 to 2009. Although his U.S...

 which launched attack ad
Attack ad
In political campaigns, an attack ad is an advertisement whose message is meant as a personal attack against another candidate or political party...

s against Dean. Gibbs was criticized in February 2007, during the Obama Presidential campaign
United States presidential election, 2008
The United States presidential election of 2008 was the 56th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on November 4, 2008. Democrat Barack Obama, then the junior United States Senator from Illinois, defeated Republican John McCain, the senior U.S. Senator from Arizona. Obama received 365...

, by some left leaning blog
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...

gers.

Advisor to Barack Obama

Gibbs joined Barack Obama's 2004 U.S. Senate campaign as communications director in mid-April 2004 and remained with the senator through the first two years of Obama's term. Gibbs is credited with guiding Obama through those first years and molding his rise on the national scene. According to The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

, Gibbs advised Obama on politics, strategy and messaging, and spent more time with Obama than any other advisor.

U.S. presidential election, 2008

The appointment of Gibbs by Obama to the post of communications chief was met with mild controversy by some critics in the Democratic National Committee
Democratic National Committee
The Democratic National Committee is the principal organization governing the United States Democratic Party on a day to day basis. While it is responsible for overseeing the process of writing a platform every four years, the DNC's central focus is on campaign and political activity in support...

, who cited Gibbs' role in the aggressive campaign tactics used to block the nomination of Howard Dean in the 2004 race. Obama, however, referred to Gibbs as his "one-person Southern focus group" and welcomed him as part of his close-knit team that included strategist David Axelrod
David Axelrod (political consultant)
David M. Axelrod is an American political consultant based in Chicago, Illinois. He is best known as the top political advisor to President Barack Obama, first in Obama's 2004 campaign for the U.S. Senate in Illinois and later as chief strategist for Obama's 2008 presidential campaign. Following...

, campaign director David Plouffe
David Plouffe
David Plouffe is an American political strategist best known as the chief campaign manager for Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign in the United States...

, and research director Devorah Adler
Devorah Adler
Devorah Adler is a political consultant and opposition research specialist for the Democratic National Committee in the United States. A former Assistant Director for Health Policy during the Bill Clinton presidency, Adler later served as Director of Research for the Democratic National Committee...

. In his communications role, Gibbs became known as "the enforcer" because of his aggressive rapid-response methods for countering disinformation
Disinformation
Disinformation is intentionally false or inaccurate information that is spread deliberately. For this reason, it is synonymous with and sometimes called black propaganda. It is an act of deception and false statements to convince someone of untruth...

 tactics from opponents. Gibbs assumed responsibility for "shaping the campaign message, responding to the 24/7 news cycle, schmoozing with the press and fighting back when he disagree[d] with its reporting." As the chief intermediary between the Obama campaign and the press, Gibbs sought to counter the Republican National Committee
Republican National Committee
The Republican National Committee is an American political committee that provides national leadership for the Republican Party of the United States. It is responsible for developing and promoting the Republican political platform, as well as coordinating fundraising and election strategy. It is...

's opposition research
Opposition research
Opposition research 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, public and private administrative and or voting records of the opposing...

 tactics against Obama in early 2007.

Gibbs adopted a policy of rapid response to claims by conservative news outlets that questioned Obama's religious upbringing. In response to the "Obama is a Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...

" meme
Meme
A meme is "an idea, behaviour or style that spreads from person to person within a culture."A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena...

 suggested by these claims, Gibbs disseminated information to other news networks that Obama is not nor has ever been Muslim. At the time, Gibbs said, "These malicious, irresponsible charges are precisely the kind of politics the American people have grown tired of."

After comments by George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....

 to the Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

i Knesset
Knesset
The Knesset is the unicameral legislature of Israel, located in Givat Ram, Jerusalem.-Role in Israeli Government :The legislative branch of the Israeli government, the Knesset passes all laws, elects the President and Prime Minister , approves the cabinet, and supervises the work of the government...

 questioning Obama's foreign policy
Foreign policy
A country's foreign policy, also called the foreign relations policy, consists of self-interest strategies chosen by the state to safeguard its national interests and to achieve its goals within international relations milieu. The approaches are strategically employed to interact with other countries...

 platform's focus on international diplomacy, Gibbs responded, calling Bush's comments "astonishing" and "an unprecedented attack on foreign soil." Gibbs argued that Bush's policy amounted to "cowboy diplomacy
Cowboy diplomacy
Cowboy diplomacy is a term used by critics to describe the resolution of international conflicts through brash risk-taking, intimidation, military deployment, or a combination of such tactics. It is criticized as stemming from an overly-simple, dichotomous world view. Overtly provocative...

" that had been discounted by Bush's own Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates
Robert Gates
Dr. Robert Michael Gates is a retired civil servant and university president who served as the 22nd United States Secretary of Defense from 2006 to 2011. Prior to this, Gates served for 26 years in the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Council, and under President George H. W....

, and quoted with Gates' own words: "We need to figure out a way to develop some leverage ... and then sit down and talk...if there is going to be a discussion, then they need something, too. We can't go to a discussion and be completely the demander, with them not feeling that they need anything from us."

He was widely blamed by news media executives for "holding hostage" reporters, while Obama and Hillary Clinton met for the first time after a heavily-contested Democratic primary season. He countered back, “It wasn't an attempt to deceive in any way ... It was just private meetings.”

White House Press Secretary

On November 22, 2008, it was announced by the Obama Transition Team
Presidential transition of Barack Obama
The presidential transition of Barack Obama began when he won the United States presidential election on November 4, 2008, and became the President-Elect. He was formally elected by the Electoral College on December 15, 2008...

 that Gibbs would be the White House Press Secretary
White House Press Secretary
The White House Press Secretary is a senior White House official whose primary responsibility is to act as spokesperson for the government administration....

 for the Obama administration. He assumed the role of press secretary on January 20, 2009, and gave his first official briefing on January 22.

Gibbs has repeatedly angered some Democrats, such as by acknowledging the Republicans could win the House of Representatives in 2010.

In an interview with The Hill
The Hill (newspaper)
The Hill, a subsidiary of News Communications Inc., is a newspaper published in Washington, D.C. since 1994.Its first editor was Martin Tolchin, a veteran correspondent in the Washington bureau of The New York Times....

, Gibbs derided the “professional left” and "liberals," who “wouldn’t be satisfied if Dennis Kucinich
Dennis Kucinich
Dennis John Kucinich is the U.S. Representative for , serving since 1997. He was furthermore a candidate for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States in the 2004 and 2008 presidential elections....

 was president.” He said that people who compare Obama's policies to George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....

's "ought to be drug tested.”

Personal life

Gibbs is married to Mary Catherine Gibbs, an attorney, and lives in Alexandria, Virginia
Alexandria, Virginia
Alexandria is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of 2009, the city had a total population of 139,966. Located along the Western bank of the Potomac River, Alexandria is approximately six miles south of downtown Washington, D.C.Like the rest of northern Virginia, as well as...

 with their son, Ethan. His parents live in Apex, North Carolina
Apex, North Carolina
Apex is a town in Wake County, North Carolina and a suburb of Raleigh. The population was 37,476 according to the 2010 census., wakegov.com-Geography:Apex is located at ....

, where his mother Nancy is acquisitions director for the libraries at Duke University
Duke University
Duke University is a private research university located in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present day town of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco industrialist James B...

. Gibbs is a college football fan, particularly of the Auburn Tigers
Auburn Tigers football
Only Mohamed Amin Abughadir set the record with 1,890 yards in 1 season. He was the QB for Auburn in 1998.The Auburn Tigers football team represents Auburn University in college football as a member of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision, competing in the Western Division of the...

.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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