Jim Manley, who stepped down as Sen. Harry Reid’s spokesman and communications director late last year, is joining QGA Public Affairs in the capital as a senior director.
Manley, who joined Reid in 2004, was an aide to Democratic Sens. Edward Kennedy (Mass.) for 12 years and George Mitchell (Me.), in addition to Reid (Nev.) in more than two decades in the Senate.
He said in November that he was “itching for a new adventure.”
At QGA, a WPP unit, he’ll focus on communications and government affairs clients with a goal of expanding its public affairs practice.
The firm’s announcement of Manley’s hiring today carried an endorsement from Reid. “After 21 years in the Senate, no one knows more about Capitol Hill and how Washington works than Jim,” said the senator.
QGA president John Feehery, a former aide to Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert, said he and Manley “have had our fair share of political disagreements over the years,” but noted they developed a mutual respect in friendship in that time. He called Manley’s hiring a “major coup” for the firm.