MARTIN'S MANDATE: When attorney Ed Martin failed to win his bid for congress in November, he left behind a lot of disappointed supporters and one REALLY unhappy campaign communications director.
Theresa Petry was, for many, the face of the Martin campaign. So it came as a surprise yesterday when she briefly posted the following on her Facebook wall: "ALL politicians are: egotistical, shady, and talk out of both sides of their mouth! Many are male chauvinists! Very disappointed to know I worked my butt off ... but it seems I won't get paid what was originally promised! Now I know why when I asked for a contract 4 different times ... I was ignored :( -- Lesson learned! Never work in politics."
Yes, Petry acknowledged today, the posting was a reference to Martin.
"He thinks that apparently I agreed to work February and March for free. That's not how I remember it," she added.
Petry said she had been doing some volunteer work for Martin in February and then got a job offer from a television station in Springfield, Mo., where she had worked before. When she told Martin she was thinking of taking the offer, he asked her what it would take to keep her on the campaign.
When they reached terms, Petry said she expected to be paid from that point on. And, when she got her first pay check in April, Petry thought it was going to include pay for the preceeding two months of work. It didn't. When the campaign concluded with Martin's loss on Nov. 2 (although he didn't concede until Nov. 8), Petry was still hopeful that she would get the back pay she believed she had coming.
Instead, she said Martin told her the pay she had received was all she was going to get. She said the amount in question is "several thousand" dollars.
"My parents donated to his campaign and I told them they should have donated to my salary instead," Petry noted.
Martin said Petry had been a "valuable member of the campaign" and declined to discuss the pay issue. "I don't think it's really helpful to discuss personnel stuff," he added.
What's the aftermath in Petry's opinion?
"I will never work in politics again. Never, ever, ever again. I'm done with politics for my lifetime."
