David Frey

Assistant Director of Speechwriting and Strategic Communications, Office of the President
Age: 32
Hometown: Marseilles, Ill.
Time at Georgetown: 3 years

What drew you to the position?
I went to a Jesuit university in the Midwest and I really wanted to reconnect with a lot of the values that drive this community.

How did you get your start in speechwriting?
I worked on Capitol Hill for seven-and-a-half years. 

In whose office?
I worked for a man named Dave Obey, who has since retired, Barbara Boxer from California and Gwen Moore from Milwaukee. 

What’s the nature of your job at Georgetown?
The nature of my job is supporting communications efforts and helping support the president in his work. 

What are some of the things you do to strengthen your work?
The thing you can do best is read and consume information without abandon. When think about some of the times people get tripped up, it’s when they make a reference that they don’t quite know the background of, and so many things can be traced back through literature. To be able to have sources and be able to pull references, always be reading.

What advice would you give current students who are aspiring speechwriters?
A big thing now is online presence, so practicing writing for an audience. Practice writing for things you care about and for creating content that people will want to read. You need to know your own strengths and weaknesses, but to be able to know what matters that’s written. We read things and say, “Oh, that’s very beautiful,” but when you hear it, it’s not impactful, so you want to think of both of those at the same time.

Is there any Jesuit theme or reference that inspires you for speechwriting?
I always appreciated authenticity and being really in tune with yourself, and the moments of consolation and the moments of desolation. To seek always what is it that drives you and how does that push you in a certain direction. That’s sort of, in a nutshell, authenticity.

Interview by Danny Funt