Patrick Hayward Caddell (May 19, 1950 – February 16, 2019)[1] was an American public opinion pollster and a political film consultant who served in the Carter administration.

He worked for Democratic presidential candidates George McGovern in 1972, Jimmy Carter in 1976 and 1980, Gary Hart in 1984 (primary), Walter Mondale in 1984 (general election), Joe Biden in 1988, and Jerry Brown in 1992.

He also worked for Mario Cuomo, Bob Graham, Michael Dukakis, Paul Simon, Ted Kennedy, Harold Washington, Andrew Romanoff and Donald Trump.

[3][7][8] In his senior year at Harvard, he borrowed $25,000 from Schultz and started a polling firm, Cambridge Survey Research, with two classmates, John Gorman (1950–2008) and Daniel Porter (1950–1973).

[10] In July 1973, Daniel Porter and his girlfriend Susan Petz were murdered on a camping trip at Adirondack Park by serial killer Robert Garrow.

[14] Consequently, Senator Ted Kennedy became concerned Caddell was being falsely accused for political reasons and sent two of his own investigators to Warren County, New York.

[13] Caddell persuaded Carter to focus in 1976 on the "trust factor", rather than divisive political issues in the 1976 campaign, a strategy which led, narrowly, to victory.

[10][20] Although Caddell was not on the government's payroll, he carried a White House pass and regularly attended strategy meetings led by Jordan.

[8] In 1977, Caddell's privileged access to the Oval Office, despite his corporate and foreign clients, led to charges of conflict of interest.

[3] Carter's Vice President Walter Mondale, who had disagreed with Caddell over the "malaise speech," instead hired Bob Beckel as campaign manager and Peter Hart as pollster.

[24][25] However, he was blamed for approving a television commercial attacking influential Chicago alderman Edward "Fast Eddie" Vrdolyak that inflicted significant damage to Hart's campaign.

[3] After Mondale's defeat in the 1984 election, Caddell started a political and corporate consulting firm with Bob Shrum and David Doak.

[3] In August 1987, after a series of one-on-one meetings and dinners with Caddell throughout the summer (ostensibly to prepare for the Robert Bork Supreme Court nomination hearings), Biden confided in his senior staff, Ridley, Tom Donilon, Kaufman, and sister Valerie Biden Owens that he was reluctant to fire Caddell due to their longstanding friendship and simply did not know what to do.

[3][28] He confronted the New York Times reporter who had initially written the Kinnock story over the phone and falsely accused his former business partners Shrum and Doak of producing the "attack video" highlighting Biden's plagiarism.

On October 1, 1987, Michael Dukakis acknowledged that his campaign manager, John Sasso, was the one who had given the New York Times reporter the Biden plagiarism videotape.

[3] One week after Biden withdrew, he met with Caddell in Wilmington and told him that "his advice would no longer be welcomed in any future political endeavor".

[43] His longtime friend, Warren Beatty, encouraged him to get involved in the movie industry, and they collaborated on the 1998 satirical film Bulworth.

[43][45] Caddell served as a consultant on various scripted productions, most notably the feature films Apocalypse Now, Air Force One, Outbreak, and In the Line of Fire; the made-for-television movies Running Mates and Y2K; and the television series The West Wing.

He was criticized by Media Matters for America and Salon columnist Steve Kornacki for predicting negative consequences for the Democratic Party.

[20] He attacked John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign, which was led by his estranged former business partner Bob Shrum, as "political crypto-gangsters who have taken over the heart and soul of the Democratic Party in Washington," and that "their job is hold on to power and hold on to money.”[28][55] In January 2010, Trippi, Celinda Lake, and Caddell were named as consultants to Andrew Romanoff’s Senate campaign in Colorado.

[57] In the run-up to the 2012 presidential election, Caddell was involved in the founding of a conservative non-profit group called "Secure America Now," which ran ads featuring Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu to target Jewish-American voters.

[28][45] Both Caddell and Bannon were Irish Catholics who had grown up in the South, detested both major political parties, and had previous ties in Hollywood.

[28][45] According to online magazine Slate, Caddell was involved in identifying people willing to participate in the 2012 anti-Obama documentary The Hope and the Change, produced by Steve Bannon and Citizens United.

[28] In an August 2016 radio interview with Breitbart editor-in-chief Alex Marlow, Caddell accused Reuters of rigging the polls and predicted a Trump victory.

[71] According to a 1987 profile in the Washington Monthly: Caddell believes the key to winning contemporary elections is appealing to 'alienated' voters—that ever-growing group of mostly younger voters who are not easily identified as liberal or conservative and don't trust government, politicians, or the parties.

[72] According to Professor Kendra Stewart at the College of Charleston, Caddell had not been ill prior to his stroke and his death was a shock to those who knew him.

[73] In a statement, former President Jimmy Carter said, "Pat Caddell was a brilliant pollster who at a young age provided me with key information and over his career helped to shape the future of professional research.

"[67]Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway expressed her condolences on Twitter, stating that,"Pat Caddell (Carter) & Richard Wirthlin (Reagan) helped revolutionize the use of polling in presidential campaigns, and guided/encouraged newbie pollsters like me.