SC’s Clay Middleton joins President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team
A well-known South Carolina name will help shape President-elect Joe Biden’s transition into the White House before Jan. 20.
South Carolina Democratic strategist Clay Middleton, who has helped lead three presidential campaigns and held positions in the Obama administration, joined Biden’s transition team this fall as House legislative advisor, responsible for outreach with members of Congress and other stakeholders.
Middleton, who turns 39 this week, officially joined the team in September helping to handle personnel requests and answer policy and administrative questions between the president-elect’s transition team and Capitol Hill. Prior to joining the transition team, Middleton said he took leave at Mercury, a Washington-based public strategy firm, where he was announced in June as senior vice president for the firm’s Washington and South Carolina offices.
For now, Middleton will stay home-based in Charleston, doing “a lot of calls and a lot of Zooms,” he told The State by phone Sunday.
Middleton, a combat veteran who served as an aide for U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn — a top Democratic Party kingmaker in South Carolina whose endorsement is credited with helping to save Biden’s presidential campaign this year — has an extensive resume.
He served as senior political advisor for former Democratic presidential candidate and U.S. Sen. Cory Booker. And he was Hillary Clinton’s South Carolina state director during the 2016 primary and Clinton’s regional political director in Florida. He also worked as political director for then-Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s general election campaign in 2008 and, in the White House, worked on faith-based and neighborhood partnerships. Middleton has also held positions in the Department of Energy and National Nuclear Security Administration.
Middleton told The State his primary goal is to ensure a smooth transition for Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.
“I’m honored and humbled to play a role in making sure that the president-elect and the vice president-elect hit the ground running come January 2020,” Middleton said.
South Carolina should expect a role to play in the next administration if history holds.
Biden has had a long relationship with South Carolina and with a variety of power players in the state that could translate into jobs for known names including Trip King, whose ties to Biden go back as far as the 1970s and who worked for the late Sen. Fritz Hollings, and state Sen. Dick Harpootlian, a Columbia Democrat and major Biden backer.
There’s also Jaime Harrison, who unsuccessfully ran this year against Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, but whose ties to Clyburn and the national Democratic Party could help him swing a role in the administration.
However, Harrison is reportedly being eyed as the next Democratic National Committee chairman, a post Harrison first ran for in 2017.
Clyburn told The Atlantic that while he had not mentioned the chair election to Biden, “all of Biden’s friends know what I feel about it.”
This story was originally published November 15, 2020 at 3:56 PM.
