Murray Chotiner

Murray Chotiner

Murray M Chotiner (October 4, 1909 – January 30, 1974) was an American political strategist, attorney, government official, and close associate and friend of President Richard Nixon during much of the 37th President's political career. He served as campaign manager for the future president's successful runs for the United States Senate in 1950 and for the vice presidency in 1952, and managed the campaigns of other California Republicans. He was active in each of Nixon's two successful runs for the White House in low-profile positions.

Chotiner was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; his father moved the family to California and then abandoned his wife and children. Murray Chotiner attended UCLA, and graduated from the Southwestern School of Law. He practiced law in Los Angeles, and branched out into public relations. Involving himself in Republican politics, he played an active part in several political campaigns and made an unsuccessful run for the California State Assembly in 1938.

Nixon retained Chotiner as a consultant to his first congressional campaign in 1946. In an era when the perceived threat of communism was a major domestic issue, Chotiner advised the future president to link his liberal opponent, Representative Jerry Voorhis, to a political organization which was believed to be communist-dominated. Nixon was elected, and hired Chotiner to run his 1950 Senate campaign against Representative Helen Gahagan Douglas. Chotiner used a similar strategy in that campaign, stressing Douglas' liberal voting record and printing the accusations on pink paper to hint at communist sympathy. Congressman Nixon easily defeated Douglas, and Chotiner next managed Nixon's 1952 vice presidential campaign and counseled Nixon through allegations of antisemitism and revelations that there was a privately run fund to pay Nixon's political expenses—revelations that the candidate decisively overcame with his televised Checkers speech.

After Congress investigated Chotiner in 1956, suspecting he was using his connections to Nixon for influence peddling to benefit his private legal clients, the vice president and his former campaign manager temporarily parted ways. Nixon recalled him to work on his unsuccessful 1962 campaign for Governor of California, and again for his successful 1968 presidential bid. After Nixon was inaugurated in 1969, Chotiner received a political appointment to a government position and, in 1970, became a member of the White House staff. He returned to private practice a year later, but was involved in Nixon's 1972 re-election campaign. Chotiner described the Watergate break-in that occurred during Nixon's 1972 campaign and that eventually brought down the Nixon administration as "stupid", and when a newspaper accused him of organizing it, he sued for libel and won a substantial settlement. He remained an informal adviser to Nixon until he died in Washington, D.C., following an auto accident in January 1974, and Nixon mourned the loss of a man he described as a counselor and friend.