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A Bush Aide's Long Road From The White House
By Sridhar Pappu Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, July 12, 2007; Page C01
On a snowy evening in December 1998, Sara M. Taylor, the daughter of a former pipe fitter at a John Deere plant in Iowa, came to a meeting at the Capital Hilton. Washington had grown dark and quiet, and the hotel restaurant was empty, save two people: Omaha financial guru Warren Buffett, and the man she was there to meet -- Karl Rove. Rove had just helped reelect George W. Bush as governor of Texas, and now Rove and Bush had begun the slow process of building a presidential run.
Over the course of an hour Rove quizzed her on the politics of her home state. Her dad, before she was born, had done a stint in the Iowa legislature, and two years earlier she'd taken a year off from her studies at Drake University to work on the presidential campaign of Texas senator Phil Gramm. They spoke about the coalitions needed to win -- social conservatives and the agriculture constituency -- and about the need to meet people personally. Suddenly, Bush himself walked in, plopped down beside her and Rove and drilled her about what he needed to know to win Iowa. In a matter of months, Taylor moved back to Iowa, helping to set up Bush's 2000 win. She was 24.
Sara M. Taylor testifies on the firing of nine U.S. attorneys. Sara M. Taylor testifies on the firing of nine U.S. attorneys. (Dennis Cook - AP)
That was the beginning of Taylor's relationship with the two men. The end is proving more difficult to resolve.........
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