'Professional malpractice': The Platner fallout engulfs the operatives who made him [View all]
The downfall of Platner, who denies the assault claim, has cast doubt on the model of scouring battleground states for candidates who fit the mold of charismatic outsider, and has left an uncertain future for the circle of operatives who engineered Platner’s rise. It’s not just Moraff and Katz facing the heat: Fight Agency, the buzzy progressive firm founded by veteran strategist Rebecca Katz, which Moraff is not a part of, had been riding a remarkable hot streak after propelling Mamdani to City Hall and sweeping several closely watched New York primaries last month — victories that gave momentum to a progressive power shift and made its strategists among the most sought-after and scrutinized operatives in Democratic politics.
“In the year and a half since FIGHT launched, we have taken on the DC establishment and the political machine time after time, and won,” Rebecca Katz and Morris Katz said in a joint statement to POLITICO. “We have defeated establishment incumbents, FIGHT has shown in district after district across the country that there is a hunger for a populist politics that takes on a broken status quo . We make ads, advise candidates on strategy, and win races — we are proud of the work we do. And we enjoy doing it together. While there’s no relation, we are family.”
Moraff declined to comment.
Interviews with more than two dozen Democratic operatives, former campaign officials and people who worked with Fight Agency and Moraff on other campaigns — along with internal text messages, emails and documents reviewed by POLITICO — paint a damning portrait of how the Platner advisers sold an under-vetted candidate as the future of the party despite warnings from the campaign’s own staff. And it wasn’t just isolated to Maine.
https://www.politico.com/news/2026/07/17/platner-is-finished-does-the-same-fate-await-the-out-of-state-consultants-who-recruited-him-01002652
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