Mark Salter

Mark Salter is an American speechwriter from Davenport, Iowa, known for his collaborations with United States Senator John McCain on several nonfiction books as well as on political speeches. Salter has also served as McCain's chief of staff for a while, although he had left that position by 2008. Salter has often been referred to as McCain's "alter ego".
During the John McCain presidential campaign, 2008 the Wall Street Journal wrote that "When it comes to Sen. McCain's image, Mr. Salter, 53 years old, is the campaign's chief creator, shaper and enforcer. For two decades, he has been the presumed Republican nominee's speechwriter, adviser and confidant." But he almost left the campaign in mid-2007 when it suffered a collapse and there were many personnel shake ups. During the latter stages of the campaign Salter became the leader attacker of media treatment of the candidate,s which he said was consistently tilted in his rivals favor.
Some observers have credited McCain's whole public servant persona as a literary project due to Salter's efforts. In this sense it reshaped the cultural and political image of McCain and served to bring forth his POW service as he had never done before.
Of their writing process Salter said in 2008: "It's his voice, but I'm going inside his head to speak some psychological truth about him. I'm drawing a conclusion based on my observation of him. I always show him: 'This is what I've written. This is what I think about you. Is this fair?' " Observers of the two have likened their sharing to that of a Vulcan mind meld.
Howard Fineman wrote: "McCain and Salter are stylistically similar and share a world view: they like to operate in intimate settings, with a loyal band of brothers, a clear enemy in sight and an almost joyful fatalism in the face of long odds." He compared Salter's role to that of Boswell.
He is portrayed as a sympathetic figure by actor Jamey Sheridan in the 2012 HBO production of Game Change for his role in the latter months of McCain's unsuccessful 2008 Presidential campaign.
Following the 2008 campaign loss, which McCain took hard, Salter became less of a presence in the McCain political operation.
Salter grew up in Davenport, Iowa. There he attended Roman Catholic parochial schools. Salter had a wandering upbringing and early adulthood, not settling down, working on railroad track maintenance in Iowa for four years and playing in a music group. Salter first entered politics as a speech writer r for U.S. Ambassador to the UN Jeane Kirkpatrick. Salter first began working for McCain following a chance encounter at the 1988 Republican National Convention. At some later point he attended Georgetown University.
Aside from having worked on Senator McCain's staff for 19 years (as of 2008), Salter has also written, in collaboration with McCain, the books
Thirteen Soldiers: A Personal History of Americans at War (2014)
Why Courage Matters: The Way to a Braver Life (2004)
Faith of My Fathers (1999)
Worth the Fighting For (2002)
Character Is Destiny: Inspiring Stories Every Young Person Should Know and Every Adult Should Remember (2005)
Hard Call: Great Decisions and the Extraordinary People Who Made Them (2007)
Unlike the many politicians who use ghostwriters for their books, McCain has always given Salter front-cover credit, and also splits income from the books with Salter evenly. That even split is a rarity in the political world and allowed Salter and his wife - herself a formerly secretary on McCain's staff - to set up a second residence in Maine.
Some point to Salter as the author of the anonymously written 2011 book O: A Presidential Novel. This has been generally accepted as so.
Salter lives in Alexandria, Virginia, with his wife Diane; they have two daughters.
In May 2016 Salter announced he would support Hillary Clinton in the United States presidential election, 2016, rather than the presumptive Republican nominee.