Helping out his political soulmates

The Conservative Party has hired Barack Obama's campaign manager Jim Messina for its general election campaign team, BBC Newsnight has learned.

Sources confirmed that he would act as a campaign strategy adviser to the Conservative party.

A lifelong Democrat, Mr Messina masterminded the US president's successful 2012 re-election campaign.

The political parties in Westminster are readying themselves for the general election, now under two years away.

There are already established links between UK Prime Minister David Cameron's team and Mr Obama's Democrats.

In 2012 Mr Cameron visited the US in a trip widely seen as an endorsement of Mr Obama
In the run-up to the TV debates of the 2010 UK general election campaign, the Tories brought Obama adviser Anita Dunne over to advise Mr Cameron on how to handle the debates, which are a familiar feature of US presidential races.

Then, in the year of the presidential election, Mr Cameron flew to the US in a trip interpreted by many as an endorsement of Mr Obama. Mr Cameron travelled with Mr Obama to watch a college basketball match in the crucial swing state of Ohio, and heavily praised the US president in his state dinner speech.

Jim Messina, President Barack Obama’s campaign manager, assured a group of Democratic donors from the financial services industry that Obama won’t demonize Wall Street as he stresses populist appeals in his re-election campaign, according to two people at the meeting.