Happy Birthday to Political Operative, Journalist David Brock

David Brock was born today, November 2, in 1962. He is a political operative, author, and commentator who founded the media watchdog group Media Matters for America. He has been described by Time as "one of the most influential operatives in the Democratic Party".

Brock began his career as a right-wing investigative reporter during the 1990s who wrote the book The Real Anita Hill and the Troopergate story, which led to Paula Jones filing a lawsuit against Bill Clinton. In the late 1990s, he switched sides, aligning himself with the Democratic Party, and in particular with Bill and Hillary Clinton.

In 2004, he founded Media Matters for America, a non-profit organization which describes itself as a "progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media." He has since also founded super PACs called American Bridge 21st Century and Correct the Record, has become a board member of the super PAC Priorities USA Action, and has been elected chairman of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW).

The Nation has described Brock as a "conservative journalistic assassin turned progressive empire-builder," while National Review has called him a "right-wing assassin turned left-wing assassin," and Politico has profiled him as a "former right-wing journalist-turned-pro-Clinton crusader."

The Los Angeles Times has described Brock as “integral to Hillary's run” for the presidency in 2016. A March 6, 2015, article in National Review noted that while other “Democratic kingmakers” were “in retreat” in the wake of the news that Hillary Clinton had “used a private e-mail account on a private server to avoid public scrutiny while secretary of state,” Brock remained fiercely loyal. Appearing on MSNBC’s Morning Joe in 2015, Brock insisted that Clinton had violated no rules by using a private email server. 

Brock was formerly the domestic partner of William Grey; their relationship ended in a bitter, 3-year-long legal battle in which "Brock and Grey traded angry accusations, ... replete with charges of blackmail, theft and financial malfeasance" related to a Rehoboth Beach, Delaware house that the two once shared. Grey filed a lawsuit against Brock in January 2011, and Brock countersued Grey in March 2011. The dispute was settled at the end of 2011 on confidential terms.

In March 2017, Brock suffered a heart attack while at work at Media Matters headquarters; he is expected to fully recover.