Former Virginia politics reporter, communications strategist cited in House Trump investigation

Former NBC29 State Capitol Bureau chief Tim Murtaugh played a crucial part in Thursday’s prime-time listening to of the Dwelling find committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 insurgency led by previous president Donald Trump.

Murtaugh was wrapping up his almost two-year stint as director of communications for the Trump re-election campaign when he texted deputy director Matthew Wolking on Jan. 9 about the president’s silence on the loss of life of Capitol Police Officer Brian D. Sicknick from accidents Sicknick sustained even though defending the U.S. Capitol from the attack by a team of professional-Trump rioters.

“Shitty not to have even acknowledged the dying of the Capitol Law enforcement officer,” Murtaugh texted, according to a transcript produced by the Property panel.

“That is enraging to me,” Wolking replied. “Everything he reported about supporting legislation enforcement was a lie.”

“You know what that is, of training course, if he acknowledged the useless cop, he’d be implicitly faulting the mob. And he won’t do that, mainly because they’re his persons,” Murtaugh replied to Wolking. “And he would also be shut to acknowledging that what he lit at the rally bought out of manage. No way he acknowledges a little something that could ultimately be referred to as his fault. No way.”

Murtaugh is now a principal with Line Drive Public Affairs LLC, an Alexandria-primarily based PR and communications system business. He joined the Trump re-election marketing campaign in 2019 immediately after serving as communications director for the USDA, Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Lou Barletta and the Republican Governors Association.

Murtaugh experienced also served as director of communications for the Republican Celebration of Virginia and former Lawyer General Jerry Kilgore.

A 1991 graduate of Temple University, Murtaugh commenced his job as a member of the news media, performing for two years as a information anchor and reporter at WBQB-FM/WFVA-AM in Fredericksburg ahead of launching the Condition Capitol Bureau for NBC29 in 1994, remaining there by way of the conclusion of 1999.