Clinton demotes chief strategist Mark Penn

Mark Penn, a divisive figure who has worked with Clinton and former President Clinton for more than a decade, is considered one of the architects of her campaign.

He has been under increasing scrutiny since Sen. Clinton lost her once-commanding lead and found herself scrambling to stop Sen. Barack Obama's coronation as the party's nominee.

Last week, Penn acknowledged that while advising the campaign, he was working on behalf of a proposed trade pact with Colombia that labor unions fiercely oppose. Clinton, who has been courting union members, especially ahead of the April 22 Pennsylvania primary, has said she will vote against the treaty in the Senate.

Clinton campaign manager Maggie Williams said in a statement Sunday that Penn had asked "to give up his role as chief strategist," but would "continue to provide polling and advice to the campaign."

Political strategists say that campaign shake-ups rarely register much with voters. But Penn's demotion reinforces an image of disarray in a campaign that has tried to focus on Clinton's experience and readiness to be, as she says, "commander in chief on Day One."

Because the change is not a total break with Penn, the demotion may not mollify influential labor groups who for months have hammered Clinton for retaining Penn while his firm -- public relations behemoth Burson-Marsteller, where he is worldwide president and chief executive -- worked for clients with allegedly anti-labor agendas.

"This goes to the bigger point that Hillary Clinton has been terribly ill-served by her campaign," said Peter Fenn, a longtime Democratic strategist. "She's a strong candidate. But I'm pretty appalled at what the campaign has done."

Penn, a longtime member of the Clintons' inner circle, began working with President Clinton in the mid-1990s, helping steer his reelection effort in 1996. He was Hillary Clinton's pollster and message guru in her 2000 Senate campaign.

When she began her campaign for president, it was Penn's strategy to cast her as a seasoned politician and the inevitable choice to put a Democrat back in the White House.

As the election season unfolded, however, voters seemed less entranced by Washington experience than by the hope of change offered by Obama.