• "I missed politics"

  Scott Stanzell returns to the nation's captial as the White House's deputy press secretary.

  
  
• Politics had dominated Scott Stanzel's professional life. But the long hours had taken its toll on the 1995 journalism and mass communication and political science graduate.
  
  He was starting to get burned out.
  
  So after helping get President George W. Bush re-elected in 2004 (he served as the Bush campaign's press secretary and worked in the White House during Bush's first term), Stanzel stepped back from politics and moved almost as far away from the Beltway as you can get.
  
  "It was time for me to get away from politics for awhile," Stanzel said. "I had worked on the past three presidential campaigns and that was enough."
  
  Stanzel moved to Seattle where he served as a communications executive with Microsoft. He traded in his Washington, D.C., suit and tie for a more casual look. The hours were shorter, press requests more manageable and job pressures weren't as great.
  
  "It was a real eye opener," Stanzel said. "We would work on a project at Microsoft for months at a time. There wasn't that immediacy that I was used to at the White House."
  
  While many individuals would love the new lifestyle, Stanzel started to get that itch again - the itch to be back in the political game.
  
  He started a blog on political issues. He remained in contact with friends back on the other coast. He even served as a technical adviser on the last season of the television series "The West Wing."
  
  But none of those activities came close to making the itch go away. So when Tony Snow, the White House press secretary, called about a job, Stanzel jumped at the opportunity.
  
  Now he works down the hall from the most powerful man in the world as a deputy assistant to the President and deputy press secretary, a job he started right after the 2006 mid-term elections.
  
  "I missed politics, the adrenaline rush that you get from working in the White House," he said. "Plus I do believe the work that happens here is important and believe in what the President is doing.
  
  "I had the luxury of being fairly mobile. I didn't have any pets or even any plants to take care of. And I may never have this opportunity again."
  
  Stanzel has made the most of the opportunity. Working closely with Snow and Snow's successor Dana Perino, he gives briefings to the White House press corps and travels the world with the President of the United States. He has direct media relations responsibility for agriculture, education, energy, transportation, homeland security, energy and immigration..
  
  Officially Stanzel's day starts at 6:15 a.m., but in reality it starts the moment he wakes up.
  
  "I'm in a constant consumption of the news in this job," he says. "Literally from the moment I wake up until I go to sleep at night."
  
  On his morning walk from his apartment to the White House, Stanzel reads the Washington Post, New York Times and other newspapers on his Blackberry. He also listens to two radio stations before he leaves and views Tivoed newscasts of the three network evening news shows after he gets home at night.
  
  "An important part of my job is to brief the press secretary on what's happening in the world before she goes into senior staff meetings or meets with the media," Stanzel said. "We pepper her with questions on the day's news."
  
  Another key role Stanzel and the White House Press Office plays is giving the "Gaggle," a morning overview of the President's day for reporters. Stanzel has given this briefing on numerous occasions. He has also conducted the on-camera briefing twice.
  
  "The ‘Gaggles' and briefings are stressful events," he said. "There are a lot of reporters throwing question after question to you on several different subjects. Preparing for all of those topics is a real effort.
  
  "By the end of the day you've talked to reporters about a lot of interesting subjects. I believe what we're doing here makes a difference in what appears in newspapers tomorrow or on television tonight."

• Scott Stanzel
  
  On Politics
  Fall 2007

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