Matt Klink specializes in running strategic/crisis communications, issues management, public affairs programs, and political campaigns. He has more than three decades of experience working on complex, controversial issues for public and private sector clients, as well as ballot measure and independent expenditure campaigns. During the last decade, Klink has worked on some of California’s most high-profile and expensive political issues, with an 80% success rate.
Throughout his career, Matt has worked for numerous heavily regulated and taxed clients encompassing a range of industries, including automotive, cable, energy, fast-moving consumer goods, finance, healthcare/pharmaceutical, oil and natural gas, renewable energy, retail, shipping, sports and entertainment, telecommunications, and water. Additionally, Klink has worked on candidate and initiative campaigns at multiple levels of government, where he has performed roles that include general consulting, campaign management, media consulting, campaign spokesperson, direct mail design and production, and coalition building.
Matt is an adept communicator skilled at crafting and implementing strategic campaigns, risk management, and crisis communication programs. He has substantial experience integrating grassroots outreach and alliance development efforts to support lobbying activities. An award-winning writer, Klink has developed effective messaging and captivating copy, including targeted direct mail, speeches, brochures, op-eds.
Skilled at working with the press, Matt has been a spokesperson and primary media contact for numerous corporate and trade association clients and statewide initiative campaigns. He regularly appears on international, national, and local TV news broadcasts for his clients and offers political analysis and commentary. He is quoted regularly on politics in national news publications.
Matt’s past work experience includes a senior-level position as Director of Global Government Affairs for Philip Morris International, based in Lausanne, Switzerland. He led a team that created and executed communications and stakeholder outreach programs on regulatory and fiscal issues in more than 35 countries on six continents. Klink has also owned and/or was a partner at three Los Angeles-based public affairs and government relations firms. Matt worked as a corporate communications consultant to America Honda Motor Co., Inc. and, while living in Arlington, Virginia, as a media consultant to candidates for U.S. Congress and the Virginia House of Delegates.
Klink holds an MA in political management from The George Washington University’s Graduate School of Political Management and a BA in history from the University of California at Berkeley. He is the immediate past president of the International Association of Political Consultants and serves on the Board of Governors for the Graduate School of Political Management. He speaks around the world about the importance of preserving democracy.
